AK and the School of Magic
by 95Jezzica
Summary: Arthur Kirkland couldn't be happier over his letter from Hogwarts - and despite his brothers' mixed feelings about the school Arthur still decides to go. However his brothers are not the only ones who keep secrets, and Arthur's first year turns out to become more dangerous than anyone originally thought it would. So perhaps the real question is, will there always be an England?
1. Ch01 - Introduction

**October 31th, 1981, Saturday**

They rarely admitted it, but the brothers of the British Isles all loved each other. Yes, they had trouble with acting civil towards each other for a longer period of time and they were most likely one of the most dysfunctional families among all of the nations, but it still didn't change the fact they cared for each other. Fights broke out all the time if they spent too much time together in the same room, but despite this the fights were rarely serious nowadays, and in a weird way it had more or less became their own way to communicate with each other. However this also meant that _when_ the fights turned serious it could quickly turn ugly, and right now it was obvious to anyone who dared to look Scotland was _furious_. He walked in great strides through the hallway, went through the door to their kitchen and then slammed the door closed before he continued to stomp forwards to North Ireland.

"Ye' were supposed to keep an eye on him!" he shouted barely centimeters from North Ireland's face.

"I did!" North Ireland shouted back in protest just as furiously at the same time as he pushed Scotland away from him.

"Clearly not enough!"

"I don't want to hear that from the one who didn't show up until two hours after Ireland!"

"Don't drag me into your mess," Ireland growled in a warning tone from where he sat at the table behind North Ireland.

"Unlike _someone_ I used my head and went to cover up our arses!" Scotland continued to yell as if Ireland hadn't said a word.

"I made sure none of those Death Eaters survived to tell the tale about a man who was hit square in the chest by _**three killing curses**_ in a row, only to turn into a screaming and still very much _**alive**_ baby!"

North Ireland opened his mouth to come with another angry retort, but was interrupted when Wales opened the door and entered the kitchen from the hallway.

"That's enough," he said with a voice which somehow managed to sound very calm, cold and angry at the same time.

Scotland, who previously had his back to Wales, quickly turned to face him while Wales in turn went to stand on Scotland's left side.

"How is he?" Scotland asked in a voice which he in the future would loudly deny sounded even the slightly bit worried.

"England is sleeping right now, but only because I put him under a sleeping spell. He's still not back to normal."

A tense silence followed as they all took in what Wales had told them.

"Why?" Ireland broke the silence after around a minute. "Shouldn't he have turned back to normal by himself already?"

Wales turned his eyes to Ireland, who by now had stood up from the chair and walked over to stand on North Ireland's right side.

"Normally he probably would have, however nations have never turned into babies after being hit by killing curses before. Something we don't know about yet must have happened at the same time."

"Why was he even attacked in the first place?" Scotland asked Wales with a scowl.

"Voldemort doesn't know of us nations, or else he would have made sure to attack England himself."

"England joined the battle, didn't he? He ignored what we told him and tried to interfere in the magical humans' affairs," Ireland guessed with badly hidden anger.

"Yes," Wales confirmed, now in a somewhat bitter voice. "He used his alias Merlin Kirkland to join a resistance group in their fight against Voldemort. If I remember correctly it's called the ' _Order of the Phoenix_ ' and is led by a man named Albus Dumbledore."

"That idiot," North Ireland hissed in rage towards their younger brother.

"So what exactly happened?" Ireland questioned, ignoring his slightly other brother.

"We don't know all the details yet, but my guess is he drew too much attention to himself when he took down Death Eater after Death Eater like they were bothersome mosquitoes rather than magical murderers," Wales explained with a sigh.  
"Voldemort decided ' _Merlin Kirkland_ ' was a threat and sent over 100 Death Eaters after him. They ambushed England on his way home from a meeting."

Ireland swore loudly at this and North Ireland still looked like he was about to murder somebody, but Scotland remained oddly quiet with a grim look on his face.

"England sent his patronus to me, so I went to save his sorry arse." Wales continued. "Scotland was visiting me at the time, so he came with me. Together we arrived at the same time as North, only to see three killing curses hit England in the chest at the same time as he sent off some kind of explosive spell which took down the last ten Death Eaters who were still able to stand."

"He screamed," Scotland added almost in a whisper and shuddered as he recalled it. "England screamed in agony as if the devil himself set his insides on fire before he fell to the ground, and then a bright, white light suddenly surrounded him and the scream was cut off. When the light was gone England was turned into a wailing baby."

"I haven't heard him scream like that since the bombing of London," Wales agreed grimly before he continued. "People from the order then began to show up with some of the still loyal aurors, so North and I ran forward and apparated away with England before they had the time to realise what happened."

Wales now turned fully towards Scotland.

"I'm sorry we left you alone to take care of the aftermath of the attack. How many of the Death Eaters were still alive?"

"None of them," Scotland commented with a tinge of pride in his voice. "I couldn't find his wand either, so he must have fought them off with wandless magic."

Wales raised an eyebrow. "That's impressive. He must have improved since the last time he fought wandless then."

"You two are getting of track," Ireland scolded in annoyance. "Why hasn't England turned back to normal yet?"

"I would like to know that too actually," North commented with a frown. "Why hasn't he? He was just hit by a few killing curses."

Wales met his brothers' gazes with a glare.

"I don't know since all of you began to yell down here when I was about to examine him, so if you want to know I suggest you follow me to England's bedroom."

With those words Wales spun around and walked out from the kitchen, and his younger brothers quickly followed him without another word. They took the stairs up to the second floor, walked down the corridor and then found themselves in England's bedroom. They gathered around the bed, and there, in the middle of the king sized bed, was the baby-version of England sleeping peacefully with a pillow on either side of him to make sure he didn't accidentally roll off the bed. If England had been a human Scotland guessed England would only be a little older than a year old. Meanwhile Wales looked almost bored while the rest of them stared at the sight before them.

"I forgot he actually looked somewhat cute when he was younger," Scotland mumbled to himself.

North Ireland nodded once in agreement.

"He isn't that cute," Ireland muttered, annoyed, but his eyes and voice seemed to have become softer while he watched his baby-brother.

"Are you three done staring now? I want to examine him," Wales sighed in annoyance.

"Aye, go ahead," Scotland replied and took a step back to give Wales more room.

Wales rolled his eyes, but took another step forward towards the bed and bent over England to place a hand on the small baby-England's chest. Closing his eyes Wales then quietly began to chant something under his breath, and his hand on England's chest began to glow slightly in a light, blue colour. This continued for a while, but all of sudden Wales began to frown deeply and the glow around his hand became an alarming red colour.

"Oi, what's wrong?" Scotland asked with a frown, but was interrupted by a red flash when Wales suddenly flew backwards with a yelp, straight into the wall behind them.

"What the-!?"

England woke up with a cry, but Scotland quickly rushed forward and picked him up, almost as if an old instinct had woken to life again. Meanwhile North Ireland ran forward to help Wales up again, and with only a small wince from Wales they then walked back to the bed where Scotland now tried to calm down England. It took a while, but eventually England quieted down and began to nuzzle Scotland's chest instead. Scotland caught sight of his brothers' amused smirks and gave them all a deadly glare.

"Not a word to anyone."

Ireland shrugged, but didn't drop his smirk until he turned around to face Wales. "What happened?"

Wales gritted his teeth as if he still was in pain. Now when they thought about it he probably also was, but since it would be healed soon anyway the rest of the brothers weren't too concerned.

"The little bastard's magic has somehow managed to seal the part of him which makes him a nation," Wales hissed angrily, clearly annoyed.

"Ye' got to be kidding," Scotland growled. "How is that even possible and why would it do that?"

"You ask me as if you think I've seen this happen before. I haven't," Wales growled back and massaged his head. This was going to give him a headache for sure.

Scotland sighed and carefully laid down baby-England, who was now sleeping, between the pillows on the bed again.

"Can you break it? Ye' are the best one of us when it comes to dealing with seals," Scotland grudgingly asked with a frown.

It was obvious Scotland didn't like to admit Wales was better than him at something.

"Hopefully, but I'll need some time to research this to make sure I don't end up killing him."

The room fell into tense silence for a minute while they thought about this.

"Alright," Scotland eventually sighed. "Wales will begin to research for a way to break the seal, I contact what's left of the Ministry of Magic to find out some information and to come up with a cover story for us. Until England is back to normal we'll leave you to take care of the normal government work, North."

"We will need a name for England until he's back to normal," North Ireland pointed out. "If anyone asks we can just say he's our half-brother, so the big age difference between us makes sense, but he still needs a name."

"He's Arthur then. It's one of his old aliases, so it should be fine to use it again," Dylan decided.

Scotland and North Ireland nodded in agreement – they didn't have any better ideas anyway - but instead of listening Ireland turned around and began to make his way out of the room. Scotland was the first to react and managed to grab his arm harshly before Ireland could walk out.

"Where do you think you're going?"

Ireland frowned. "This has nothing to do with me. I'm not in the UK anymore, remember?"

"Bastard, he's still your brother!" Scotland shouted furiously and let go of Ireland's arm only to almost lift him up by the collar of his uniform.

"Besides, this is a magical incident and you still share the Ministry of Magic with us," Wales pointed out with an edge to his voice, but unlike Scotland still managed to keep his calm.

"Fine," Ireland snarled back and wrenched himself free from Scotland's hold. "What do you suggest I do then? You pretty much already have everything covered."

"Take care of England while we're gone," North cut in before the others had the time to answer.  
"Like you said the rest is already covered, but we can't exactly leave England by himself like this."

Ireland glared daggers at his younger brother.

"Fine, I'll babysit England. I hope you three realise I will need to go back to my own country in a few days though. Someone else will need to babysit him if he's not back to normal by then."

"We'll take care of that if it comes to down to it. Let's go and take care of this now," Scotland grumbled and pushed past Ireland towards the door.

"Wait," North Ireland began. "Shouldn't we tell the other nations about this?"

Scotland, who was already almost out of the room, stopped and turned around to face North Ireland.

"Why should we? It's none of their business," Scotland commented grumpily.

"We might be forced to though," Wales pointed out. "They will find out sooner or later if we're not able to fix this quickly anyway."

"Alright, how about this then," North Ireland suggested. "There is a meeting with the commonwealth in two weeks – if we haven't managed to change England back to normal by then we'll tell them."

"Do what ye' want – I will go and fix information and a cover story now," Scotland grumpily replied and left.

Wales sighed. "We will most likely need to tell them at some point then."

North Ireland and Wales also left the room, which left Ireland alone to take care of his now literally baby-brother.

"Great," Ireland muttered angrily and sat down on the edge of the bed. "Happy freaking Halloween."

Ireland's eyes only softened when they once again fell on the still sleeping baby between the pillows.

"You really like to give me trouble, don't you?" Ireland mumbled and gently stroked a finger over little England's cheek.  
"I suppose it's payback for all the trouble we caused you after our mother's death, but we will be even when this is over."

Little England seemed to believe this was his cue to slowly wake up, because he yawned loudly and blinked his eyes open to stare straight at Ireland.  
Ireland did _not_ move away his hand in ( _almost! almost!_ ) panic when he thought England was going to cry, and the small baby-hands which instead tried to grab Ireland's fingers were absolutely not adorable. Really. However maybe, and just maybe, this wouldn't be so bad, Ireland thought with a small smile as little England finally managed to grab one of Ireland's fingers and watched it closely in curiosity. It could have been worse.

The brothers of the British Isles all loved each other, even if they rarely admitted it – however they had no way of knowing just how much that love would come to be tested in the future. This is the beginning of a story about the boy who, because of his magic, at the moment was no longer a nation, but at same time neither was a human. This is the story about Arthur Kirkland, the sealed boy.


	2. Ch02 - Kirklands

**April 22th, 1991, Monday**

o.o.o.o.o

Nearly 10 years later from that fateful day Arthur Kirkland could only describe his current mood as frustrated. Despite the fact Arthur tried hard to focus on his book about dragons he found it difficult to ignore the increasingly heated argument coming from downstairs. It was just after dinner and his older brothers had sent him up to his room with the excuse they needed to "discuss" something without him in the way, but considering the loud yelling downstairs it sounded more like they were about to murder each other.

Arthur had to admit he was curious about the topic though. Since even Patrick arrived for a rare visit from Ireland it meant it had to be about something serious.  
Adding the fact Arthur wasn't allowed to hear the "discussion" made Arthur sure it was either about him, the government and/or the Ministry of Magic.

Once again Arthur tried to force his focus back on the book, but the voices downstairs steadily grew even louder and louder for each minute until they suddenly cut off to an abrupt stop. For a short while the only thing heard was a tense silence until the door to the kitchen opened and slammed shut, soon followed by a pair of footsteps which stopped somewhere around the stairs.

"Arthur, drag your ass down here!"

So _now_ they wanted him down there? Arthur scowled frustrated, but sat up on his bed and put down the book on his nightstand.

"What do you guys want, William?" he yelled back, annoyed.

"Get down here and you will find out!"

Fine, if that's how it was then he supposed he had to go down. N-not that he was curious about what his brothers wanted with him, mind you! He couldn't care less, but his brothers would clearly not leave him in peace until Arthur went down to see what they wanted, that's all! With this in mind Arthur quickly left his bed and went through the door out from his room, ran down the stairs and then turned left into the kitchen where he assumed his brothers still were.

The kitchen was fairly large and square, and since they only moved here less than a week ago the white tiles on the walls were actually still visible and not covered by soot from his brothers' so called cooking. Yet. The stove, cupboards, fridge and the refrigeration were all against the left wall in the kitchen, which is also where the doorway into the living room was. The square dinner table for four was on Arthur's right side and gave you a beautiful view over the gardens through the big windows. Sitting around the table also turned out to be where Arthur found his brothers. Apparently the argument was over for now though, because knowing his brothers they didn't sit down during their fight.

"Well, what do you four want?" Arthur asked with in annoyance and crossed his arms over his chest.

Right now Patrick was on the left side of the table closest to the window. His messy hair was similar to Arthur's own, although his hair was a mix of orange and blonde compared to Arthur's own blonde hair. Patrick's hair was also somewhat longer, and like everyone else in the Kirkland family he had the famous thick eyebrows. His green eyes had a tint of yellow and they were currently glaring daggers through the window as if the glass had personally insulted him and then rubbed salt into the wounds.

Next to Patrick sat William, who looked like he could be Patrick's twin if it wasn't for the slightly darker and longer hair tied into a low ponytail. He always wore an earring made of silver in his left ear and currently looked like he wished his glare could kill Scott. With short, bright red hair and a normally grumpy face Scott was the youngest of Arthur's older brothers, and was also the one who sat the closest to where Arthur stood. An important thing to note about Scott was the fact he was the one with the hottest temper of the brothers, but was still nice to everyone as long you stayed on his good side. Even Arthur was grudgingly forced to admit Scott was pleasant enough, at least during the times he didn't teas Arthur, which was something Scott liked to do often. Unlike Patrick and William he also had bright emerald coloured eyes, like Arthur, and looked unusual happy right now. Arthur had a bad feeling about it.

Meanwhile his oldest brother, Dylan, sat on the right side of the table, closest to the window, and somehow managed to look both bored and annoyed at the same time while he quietly watched the garden through the window. He had dark brown hair, and even though Arthur knew it was dyed he had no idea what Dylan's natural hair colour was. Unlike his other brothers Dylan's hair was also much shorter and not as messy, something Arthur found a little unfair. Arthur could even go as far as saying it looked somewhat straight. Dylan's eyes were in a lighter green than Arthur's with just a tiny, tiny hint of blue surrounding the pupils. Personality-wise Dylan was by far the calmest one of the older brothers and the one most difficult to anger. However once you actually managed to anger the man you better hope you either were a faster runner or quick enough to apparate away to safety. Let's just say Dylan's anger was something to be feared and nothing you wanted to be on the receiving end of.

However by now Arthur had begun to lose his patience with the fact his brothers' seemed content to ignore his question, so he decided to repeat himself.

"What do you want?"

It was almost a little unnerving how everyone suddenly snapped out of it as if they had been in trance and then shifted their gazes to Arthur.

"Well lad," Scotland grinned at Arthur as if Christmas came early and motioned for him to sit down on the empty chair at the edge of the table, which also happened to be the chair between Scott and William.

"Since ye' turn 11 tomorrow something fun is going to happen."

Alright, that caught Arthur's attention. His brothers normally never made a huge deal out of birthdays in general, so what was so different about this one?

"Arthur," Dylan began with a serious voice and Arthur shifted his eyes to his oldest brother.

"As you probably already know children with magic usually receive a letter from Hogwarts on the day they turn eleven years old, and you happen to turn eleven tomorrow."

Arthur nodded. He already knew about all this, but wondered how this mattered now.

"When I asked you about it a few years ago you told me Kirklands were home-taught everything about magic though. What changed?" Arthur questioned, and from the corner of his eyes Arthur saw how Scott's grin fell a little. However it was still Dylan who answered.

"We encountered a problem while we tried to-"

Dylan suddenly made a weird sound as if something had got stuck in his throat and began to cough with a grimace of pain at the same time as his expression briefly changed into one of annoyance.

"What did you try to do?" Arthur pressed, but Dylan only waved away the question.

"It's nothing. Anyway, your magic is only growing stronger for each day, and we thought it was about time you went to a school instead of having private tutors."

"We will most likely not have the time to teach you much magic because of our jobs," Scott added. "So you might as well go to a school which will teach you the basics for us."

It was obvious his older brothers tried to avoid his question, but Arthur also knew none of them would tell him anything once they decided to keep quiet, so Arthur let it go for now. Instead he seriously considered what Dylan and Scott told him. Apparently he used to be very sick when he was younger, although it was not something he remembered a lot of, and therefore he had been home-schooled by private tutors his whole life up to now.

It used to be fun, and Arthur liked the subjects and teachers he had, but in the end it became rather… lonely. His brothers almost always worked, and even if they sometimes were able to work from home it didn't change the fact they couldn't be with Arthur during that time. When Arthur and his brothers lived in their old house the neighboring children hadn't been mean, but they knew he was different and tended to avoid him even during the times he was allowed to go out and play. Needlessly to say Arthur didn't really have any friends in his own age, but if he began in a school _made_ for the different… Was it possible he could…? N-not that he needed any friends of course! He was perfectly fine of his own, thank you very much! Besides, to learn how to use his magic better was more than enough reason to go to Hogwarts. He wanted to go. Arthur had wanted to go to Hogwarts ever since the first time he read about the school in one of his books.

"I-", Arthur began.

"You don't have to, of course," Patrick decided to interrupt and locked eyes with Arthur.

"If you want to you can just continue like you have done until now, or even begin in a normal school," William added.

It was rare for Patrick and William to agree with each other on something, and it became clear to Arthur this was what his brothers must have been arguing about. For some reason Patrick and William didn't want him to go to Hogwarts, something Scott wanted. Arthur imagined it was Dylan who in the end was forced to break up the fight and tell them to just ask what _he,_ Arthur, wanted to do. Dylan had always seemed to be the sanest one of his brothers after all.

"Of course he wants to go to Hogwarts!" Scotland proclaimed loudly. "It's the best school for magic in the whole world!"

Wanting to know what his oldest brother thought about this Arthur turned towards Dylan with a raised eyebrow, however Dylan decided to be of no help.  
He only shrugged and came with the _sooo_ helpful advice:

"It's up to you, Arthur. At Hogwarts you'll be able to learn how to use your magic, but you will also be stuck there during most of the years until the day you graduate, with the exception of the holidays. It's a big change compared to how you have lived so far. If you want to you can continue like you have done until now or begin in a normal school instead, and I'm sure we can figure something out if you still want to learn magic. However it will still not be as much as you would have learnt at Hogwarts."

"I…" Arthur began, but was once again interrupted by Patrick.

"I don't like it - he shouldn't go to Hogwarts!" Patrick stated and sent Dylan a dark glare.

"He hasn't even received a letter yet," William warned. "He might not get one either!"

"None of you have to like it since it is Arthur's choice," Dylan reminded them and sent Patrick a look which clearly warned him against arguing about it.

"I want to," Arthur hurried to say before anyone else had the chance to interrupt him. "I want to learn how to use my magic at Hogwarts."

Scott's grin immediately widened while Dylan looked like he just accepted the answer. In turn William didn't look very happy, but neither did he say anything else about it. However Patrick stood up so quickly and with such force the whole table shook and his chair fell down while he stomped out from the kitchen and into the hallway. Arthur, who understood it was his answer which angered Patrick, ran after him. The rest of his brothers chose to not follow.

"Where are you going?"

Patrick had already put on his shoes and then went for his coat.

"I have a plane to catch," he snarled back in anger.

Arthur did _not_ flinch at the harsh voice, really, so obviously the angry expression on Patrick's face softened because of something else.  
With his expression changed into something Arthur then almost thought looked like regret Patrick ruffled Arthur's hair.

"I have to work tomorrow, so I need to catch my plane back to Ireland. I only stayed long enough for me to discuss a few things with our brothers," Patrick explained.

"Didn't you promise last week you were going to stay for my birthday?" Arthur asked with a slightly accusing voice.

Patrick shrugged. "Something came up, and apparently my coworkers are too stupid to take care of it by themselves."

"Oh," was the only thing Arthur could muster in answer while he tried to convince himself the lump in his stomach wasn't disappointment.  
Considering the look Patrick gave him at the moment Arthur didn't think he was very successful.

"Look Arthur," Patrick said with an almost sad sigh. "I still don't think you should go to Hogwarts, but if it's what you want then you should go. I had a feeling this would be your answer anyway - you and magic have always been inseparable since the day you were born."

At the last part Patrick's expression turned a little bitter, but Arthur wasn't sure why, so he decided to stay silent for the moment.

"Oh, I almost forgot!" Patrick suddenly muttered after a few seconds silence while he began to rummage through his left pocket in his coat.

Soon enough he let out a " _aha_ " when he found what he searched for and handed over a small, rectangular gift wrapped in thick white paper to Arthur.  
A birthday gift, Arthur realised with eager anticipation.

"Since I'm not going to be here for your birthday," Patrick explained with a mutter and looked away when his face turned a light red. However Arthur was too focused on the small gift in his hands to take notice.

"May I open it now?" Arthur eagerly asked instead, without looking away from his gift.

"No, save it for tomorrow when it is your actual birthday."

Arthur nodded to show he accepted the answer and looked up at Patrick again. "Thank you," Arthur said, but then seemed to realise what he had said and quickly added:  
"N-not that I needed a birthday present! I just accepted it since you already went and bought it anyway!"

To Arthur's annoyance Patrick had the nerve to look amused at his words.

"It's nice to know you are yourself even like this," Patrick laughed and opened the door.

Arthur had no idea what that was supposed to mean, so he decided to look grumpy just in case.

"I have to go, but I'll see you next time Arthur."

"Bye," Arthur muttered with a small wave and watched as Patrick apparated away to, what Arthur assumed was, the airport.

However the moment Arthur closed the door he suddenly noticed how the rest of his brothers stood in the doorway to the kitchen.

"Aw, did he give you an early birthday present," Scott teased with a grin when Arthur locked eyes with him.

"Patrick must be going soft, it's the end of the world!" William exclaimed in an exaggerated dramatic voice and held his hands over his heart.  
Even Dylan had the nerve to look amused at the scene. Traitor.

"Shut up!" was Arthur's intelligent answer to his teasing brothers before he ran down the hallway and up for the stairs, red in embarrassment.

Only when he was in the safety of his room and locked the door did he glance down on the wrapped gift he had received from Patrick.  
He allowed himself a small smile and placed the gift on top of his book about dragons on the nightstand. Tomorrow couldn't come soon enough.

o.o.o. ( **End of Chapter 02** ) .o.o.o

 **Author Note:**

 **I hope you're liking this so far! Please comment/review if you want to, so I know if you like my story.**  
 **If anyone recognize this story it's probably because I also upload it on my Deviantart, but don't worry - I'm still me. **  
**(** _I'm **Kakashi95fan** on DA, so if you want evidence on the fact I'm the writer of this story you're free to leave me a comment and ask me there._ **)**

 **Again, I hope you enjoy this, and thank you so much for reading!**


	3. Ch03 - Birthday!

The next morning came slowly, but that was mostly because Arthur had a hard time to fall asleep in in the evening. However when he woke up in the morning everything felt surprisingly normal. In one sense it was – even if Arthur's birthday was on ST. George's Day it was rare for more than one of his older brothers to be free from work, and their family never really paid a lot attention to birthdays in general. The only special about the day would be that Arthur didn't have any classes with his tutors today and maybe also receive a few birthday presents. If Arthur was lucky at least Dylan and Scott would be home in time for dinner, but he knew both Patrick and William were most likely busy with work right now.

Speaking of Patrick, would Arthur be allowed to open the gift he received now? Probably, but Arthur decided it was best to wait until he had gone down to see who was going to be home with him today. Soon enough he was therefore dressed and began to make his way down to the kitchen with a smile on his normally grumpy face, onty to be met by the normal burnt odor of Scott's failed attempt at making an edible breakfast.

"There ye' are, I just wondered when ye' would decide to wake up," Scott teased with a smile and put down a plate with what once might have been egg and bacon in front of Arthur.

Meanwhile Arthur had sat down at the right side of the table, closest to the window, so he would be able to face Scott while said man finished the breakfast.

"It's not that late," Arthur huffed and took a look at the clock on the wall. It was only 8:30 AM.

"If ye' say so," Scott answered with a smirk, then turned off the stove before he came back to the table and sat down with his own plate of food on the opposite side of Arthur while he himself began to sip his cup of tea.

"I got today off from work, so if ye' want to we can explore the forest around the house once I've taken care of the dishes," Scott suggested.  
"Dylan will be back as soon as he has taken care of the rampaging dragon, so we can expect him to be back in time for lunch."

Arthur almost choked on his tea. "A d-dragon? Is he going to be alright?"

"Of course he is," Scott replied nonchalantly. "He will take care of it by himself this time, so no one else will be there to screw it up."

Scott's answer didn't exactly reassure him – who in their right mind would take on a dragon alone!? To think Arthur thought Dylan was the sanest of his brothers...  
That clearly wasn't the case. However Scott didn't seem very concerned, so hopefully it meant Dylan knew what he was doing.  
Dylan worked with magical creatures for a living after all, so everything would hopefully turn out just fine. Hopefully.

Arthur was just about to ask Scott what exactly Dylan was going to do about the dragon, but an owl took that moment to crash into the kitchen window with a loud bang. Luckily enough the glass didn't break, but both Scott and Arthur jumped up in surprise. The second Scott hurriedly opened the window Arthur also helped the still dazed owl inside, who Arthur also noticed held a thick yellowish envelope in her neb. Scott was quick to clear away the breakfast from the table and to find some owl candy for the owl while they let her rest on the table. Meanwhile Arthur stared in shock at the thick, yellowish envelope made of parchment which the owl still held. Really, the owl couldn't be taller than eight inches ( _ca 20 cm_ ) - the letter looked almost comically large for the small owl. It was a miracle it was even able to deliver it in the first place.

"What are ye' waiting for? Grab the letter, it's addressed to ye'," Scott commented with a smirk and Arthur quickly, but gently, took away the letter from the owl.

"I forgot how creepy they could be though," Scott commented with a grimace as he walked around to the other side of the table and read over Arthur's shoulder.

The address on the letter apparently knew Arthur would be in the kitchen. Oh, the joys of magic.

However at the moment Arthur took no notice of Scott's muttering and instead eagerly began to open his letter at the same time as the owl finally began to come around again. She hooted happily from where she still stood on the table, probably waiting for an answer to return with. At the moment Arthur decided to ignore her in favour of reading his letter though, and when Arthur was done he could almost not stay still in eagerness.

"I'm going to Hogwarts," he said with a grin of happiness towards Scott. "I'm going to Hogwarts to learn magic!"

"Not until ye' have answered them and finished to eat yer breakfast," Scott reminded Arthur with a chuckle.

"Oh right!" Arthur exclaimed, then ran out from the kitchen and continued up the stairs to his room before Scott had the time to say anything else.  
He was soon back in the kitchen though, this time with parchment and a normal ballpoint with black ink in his hands.

"How should I answer?" Arthur asked Scott nervously as soon as he had laid down everything on the table.

"Just write ye' accept the offer," Scott answered with a shrug and continued to watch in amusement while his youngest brother tried to formulate a reply.

It took a while to write what Arthur passed as an acceptable answer, although it would probably have gone faster if Scott hadn't begun to teas Arthur about his handwriting or if the owl didn't become impatient and began to fly around and hoot in frustration. In the end Arthur yelled at the owl to shut up, which resulted in a pecked finger and a laughing Scott. At least the owl fell silent afterwards, so Arthur still considered it worth it. Arthur almost wrote his answer longer than the owl in revenge, but stopped himself in time since he didn't want the owl to drop his answer somewhere just because it was too heavy to carry. When the owl finally was sent off with Arthur's answer the breakfast was already cold, so Scott unceremoniously threw away what was left into the trash bin. Arthur would have complained about how it was a waste of food, if it wasn't for the fact Arthur wasn't sure he could count their breakfast as food in the first place. Therefore he didn't say anything.

When the dishes were taken care of Arthur immediately wanted to go to the Diagon Alley to buy what he needed for Hogwarts, but Scott said no.  
According to Scott there was no point to go and buy everything now when they still had months before the term would begin on the first of September.

"Besides, we decided to explore the forest around the house today, didn't we?" Scott reminded Arthur.

Despite the fact Arthur dearly wanted to go to Diagon Alley he agreed with Scott and grudgingly left the letter on the table to put on his jacket and shoes. It drizzled outside, but they knew the trees in the thick forest would protect them from the light rain and therefore didn't bother to bring an umbrella. Once outside they then slowly walked into the thick forest which surrounded their house. Since they only moved here three days ago Arthur hadn't had the time to explore yet, so he now took the chance to fully look around at everything around him.

Their house was made of white marble and looked very out of place in the thick forest. The buds on the trees around them had begun to grow, but not yet fully bloomed, so most of the trees still looked very brown and made a strong contrast against the white marble of the house. Arthur also noticed there was no obvious path which led... Well, anywhere to or from the house. The house just seemed to stand there with perhaps 25 meters of grass in each direction from the house before the first trees showed the line where the forest began. How did his brothers move everything from their old house? Did they use magic? They must have, Arthur realised, because there was no other way they could have moved all the furniture and everything else without even a road to the house. Arthur now regretted his choice to stay at Dylan's apartment in Cardiff while his brothers took care of the move – it would have been fun to see his brothers use magic. By the time Dylan had apparated to pick him up again and take him to their new home it had already been late, so Arthur hadn't thought much about it then, and the next days had rained so much he hadn't been able to go outside to notice how remote the house was placed.

It was odd really, now when he let himself think about it. Sometimes when Arthur was nearby people he could feel how strong magic they had, if they even had any in the first place, and he knew all of his brothers had an incredible amount of magic. Yet for as long as he could remember Arthur and his brothers always more or less lived their lives like muggles, with only the occasional use of magic to apparate somewhere or to perhaps repair something broken – and apparently to make sure moving only took few hours instead of days. Arthur knew this was unusual for people with magic in general, especially for a pure-blooded family like theirs.

"What are ye' daydreaming about?"

"Huh?" was Arthur's very intelligent reply as he snapped out from his thoughts to look at Scott.

"Ye' didn't even react when I just told ye' about the unicorn herd which is supposed to live in this forest, so what are ye' thinking about?" Scott asked again, looking amused.

Arthur flushed red in embarrassment as he realized how deep into the forest they already were and briefly wondered for how long he had been lost in his thoughts.

"W-well, nothing really! I just realized you, Dylan and William must have used magic when we moved to our new house since there is no road through the forest."

Scott nodded in acknowledgement. "Aye, it would have taken too long otherwise."

"So why did we move to a house in the middle of a forest anyway?"

"Because _someone_ began to have more magical accidents lately," Scott teased.

"It's not like I do it on purpose," Arthur replied with a huff as he turned even redder.

Only a few weeks ago William was forced to use a memory charm on Arthur's ( _muggle_ ) tutor in math when Arthur accidentally levitated a pile of books into the air, and three days later Scott was forced to do the same to Arthur's tutor in Gaelic when she realised Arthur had fallen asleep at the desk while his pen continued to write down notes by itself. Arthur was lucky one of his brothers had been at home at the time, because both of the tutors had begun to panic a "little" over the magic...

"I know ye' don't," Scott chuckled again in answer to Arthur's comment.

"This is just to be on the safe side until Hogwarts has done their job and taught ye' how to control yer magic."

Another hour of walking later it eventually stopped to rain while they continued to explore the forest, and they found both many magical and non-magical creatures. Arthur even saw a centaur between the trees once, but when he tried to go closer Scott had led him in a different direction.

"Centaurs are better to leave alone when it's possible," Scott had muttered nervously to him as the only explanation when they were further away.

They didn't stop exploring until hours later when Arthur's stomach loudly declared it was time for lunch, and despite Arthur's protests Scott apparated them back to the edge of the forest with a laugh. They were lucky, because when they opened the front door to the house they could smell the wonderful scent of un-burnt food and since all of the Kirkland-brothers deep down knew Dylan was the only one of them who was a decent cook among them... Well, both Scott and Arthur therefore already knew who was in the kitchen before they even entered it. Soon enough they had taken off their shoes, hanged off their jackets and joined Dylan in the kitchen.

"About time," Dylan commented without turning around from the stove when they entered the kitchen. "I almost began to think you two got lost on the path of life."

Scott snorted in amusement and Arthur got the feeling Dylan just had made a reference to something.

"Set the table, the food is almost ready."

"What's for lunch?" Scott asked and walked over to the cupboard with the plates.

"Leek soup accompanied with fresh dragon-baked bread."

Arthur could feel his eyes widen. "You baked bread in the fire of a dragon!?"

"Of course, it makes the best bread after all," Dylan replied as if it wasn't crazy at all, nor downright idiotic.  
"Besides, that dragon owned me a favour after all the trouble she put me through this morning."

Arthur wisely decided to not make any further comments and went to help Scott set the table instead.  
To think he once had considered Dylan the sanest of his brothers too... On the other hand Scott seemed to believe this was completely normal and continued the discussion.

"What kind of dragon was it? The MacFusty usually keep a good eye on the Hebridean Black, but it's unusual for a Common Welsh Green dragon to go on a rampage."

"Not if an idiotic wizard tries to steal the egg of a female," Dylan replied bitterly.

Both Scott and Arthur audibly winced at the information. No wonder the dragon had gone on a rampage.

"What happened to the thief?" Arthur questioned, not sure if he wanted to know the answer or not.

"Survived long enough for the people from the ministry to show up, but was burnt to ashes before we could save him. It took ages to calm down Beca."

"Wait, who is Beca?" Arthur couldn't help but to ask.

"The dragon of course," Dylan replied as if it was obvious and then declared the soup was done.

"Were ye' not supposed to take care of the dragon alone this time?"

Dylan sent Scott a grumpy glare while they all sat down at the table, Arthur using the same chair he sat in at breakfast while Scott sat to his left and Dylan sat down on the opposite side of Scott.

"I was _supposed_ to, yes. At least that was what Fudge promised me the last time the people from the ministry messed up," he answered bitterly before he turned to face Arthur.

"Promise me you _**NEVER**_ attempt to stun an enraged dragon with a stunning spell. Either run the fuck away in the opposite direction and let an expert take care of the dragon, or become an expert yourself so you know what to do."

"Eh, sure," Arthur replied, not sure what else to answer.

"Oh, and happy birthday by the way."

The sudden change of topic caught Arthur by surprise, but he still somehow managed to stutter out a thanks and caught the present Dylan suddenly lightly threw over the table in Arthur's direction.

"Open it after we have eaten."

With that said Arthur most likely set a new world record in eating soup quickly, because not even five minutes later he had already eaten all his soup, put his plate and spoon into the dishwasher and sat down on his chair again.

"May I open it now?"

"Sure," Dylan answered and finished his soup at the same time as Scott did.

If Arthur wasn't so eager to open his present he might have been a little more wary of the smirks both Dylan and Scott now had on their faces, but Arthur didn't notice it and made a quick affair of the dark blue paper wrapped around his present and saw his new red...

"... Collar?" Arthur asked in disbelief and slight disappointment.

By now he also noticed how his brothers' smirks only continued to widen. Was this some sort of prank?

"Go up to your room and see your real present," Scott grinned.

"Don't forget to bring the collar with you," Dylan added.

Still a little wary what his brothers could be up to Arthur rose from his chair and walked out from the kitchen, but looked back at his brothers from time to time as if to ask them if they were sure about this. They didn't give away anything else though, and just silently grinned while they followed Arthur up the stairs to his room.

The door was closed. It shouldn't be a big deal, but Arthur was sure he left it open in his haste to retrieve the parchment and pen earlier this morning when he was about to answer his letter from Hogwarts. This meant someone else had been inside his room since then, and since he and Scott had been outside since breakfast it meant this person was Dylan.

"Dylan, if there is a prank inside my room I will make sure you're the first one I kill," Arthur threatened before he took a deep breath and opened his door.

"No faith in us at all," was the last thing Arthur heard before his brain toned out the rest of what Scott said at the sight which met his eyes.

Because there, at the foot of his bed in a small basket, was an adorable tiny and sleeping kitten with orange and white fur.  
Arthur stumbled forward into his room in disbelief and continued forward until he was close enough to the basket to kneel down in front of it.

"Her name is Cassie and she turns 15 weeks old today," Arthur vaguely heard Scott proclaim proudly.

"She is a half-breed between Scottish Fold Shorthair and a Kneazle, so she will be a good and very intelligent companion for you."

Cassie woke up when Arthur knelt down in front of her basket and now sleepily meowed towards him. Slowly, to not scare her, Arthur moved his hand closer to Cassie so she could sniff his hand.

"Is she mine?" Arthur breathed out in awe just as Cassie began to purr against his hand.

"Yes," Dylan replied gently with a smile, who seemed to understand Arthur's need to confirm it to be true. "She is yours."

Arthur decided this was the best birthday he ever had.

o.o.o. **(End of chapter 03)**.o.o.o

 **Author Note:**

 **Hello again! You might wonder about the fast upload of chapters right now, and that's okay. You see, I already have 8 chapters uploaded on Deviantart, and I'm currently writing chapter 9, so until I've uploaded all of the chapters I already have uploaded on DA it will seem like I'm very quick with updates.** However please be warned: _I seriously suck at being quick to update my fanfictions, a_ _nd_ _those from DA probably already know this_ **.  
Normally it's more like I update slowly but surely. **x) **You guys don't have to worry about that just yet though!  
This is only chapter 03, so we still have 5 more chapters before you can begin to complain about how slow I update. **xD

 **I hope all of you enjoyed this chapter, and thank you so much for reading! /Jezzica**

 **(PS).** Thank you so much for the reviews **TheNameYouForgot**! I still have the 24-hours rule on my account,  
so I can't answer your reviews yet ( _if FF even allows you to answer reviews, I don't know_ ), but I'm happy you seem to like this fanfiction! So thank you!


	4. Ch04 - Diagon Alley

A little over two months later Arthur unsteadily landed on his feet with a small thud in the middle of the street, and would most likely have fallen over if Dylan hadn't been quick enough to steady him. Not that Arthur would ever admit that of course, no matter how nauseous he felt after Dylan apparated them both all the way into the Diagon Alley. For some reason Arthur always felt ill when he was apparated a longer distance, but he supposed he was at least lucky Dylan didn't bother to tease him about needing help after a long-distance apparition. N-not that Arthur had needed any help in the first place, of course! He could have taken the train into London and bought everything he needed for his first year at Hogwarts by himself! ( _An idea his brothers outright laughed at when he told them, asking him how it would look if they let an 11 year old take the train into London by himself. Arthur refused to admit they had a point._ )

"Ready?" Dylan asked with an almost amused voice.

"Of course!" Arthur snapped and shook his arm out of Dylan's hold.

Dylan began to walk towards the gigantic white building which towered over them and the nearby little shops, which in turn made Arthur hurry after his oldest brother before he was left behind. Gringotts was the only wizarding bank in Britain and was in an impressive snow-white, multistoried building made of marble. Arthur read somewhere it was also considered the safest place in the world to store anything you wanted to keep safe, except perhaps for Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. This time, however, they were on their way to make a withdrawal, and Arthur looked forward to finally be allowed to see the family vaults.

They left the shy sun who partly hid behind the clouds outside and walked past the burnished bronze doors and the bowing goblin. This led to a pair of doors in silver, engraved with an ominous warning towards those insane enough to try anything similar to robbery. After two more bowing goblins they then found themselves in a gigantic hall of marble, where around 100 goblins sat on their high chairs behind a long counter doing various tasks. There were so many doors leading away from the hall Arthur couldn't hope to count them all, and although Arthur had been here a few times before he still couldn't help to be just as fascinated each time he was here. Besides, this time he wouldn't need to wait in the hall while one of his brothers visited the vaults. No, this time Arthur would also be allowed to follow Dylan all the way and see how it looked!

Arthur only snapped out of his thoughts when he realised he and Dylan already reached the counter and Dylan was talking to a goblin.

"Good morning," Dylan began. "We're here to make a withdrawal from my personal vault."

"Name?"

"Dylan Kirkland."

"May I take a look at your wand for identification then?"

Dylan nodded, handed over his wand made of English Oak ( _For some reason_ _Arthur's other brothers thought this was hilarious since Dylan was from Wales_ ) and let the goblin examine it.

"Yes, everything seems to be in order. Someone will take you down to your vault in a moment. Is the boy going to accompany you down to the vaults?"

"Yes," Dylan answered easily.

The goblin nodded and handed back Dylan's wand before he turned around to call out to another goblin somewhere behind him. The goblin in question turned out to be rather old, who with a polite " _this way gentlemen_ " quickly began to lead both Arthur and Dylan out through one of the many doors of the hall and into a narrow stone passage only lit with torches. Arthur decided to take the opportunity to talk.

"I thought we were going to the family vaults?" he half-asked with a frown directed towards his oldest brother.

"No, thank you. I don't know about you, but I don't want to spend the next three hours just to get past the security we have on those vaults," Dylan answered with a scoff.

"Fine," Arthur grumbled, not sure if Dylan exaggerated the time it would take or not.

However despite the fact Arthur tried to hide his disappointment something in his voice must have given it away.

"Chin up, I don't see why you want to see what is inside those old things. Trust me when I say you'll thank me later when we don't have to go even further on those small carts anyway," Dylan said with a smirk.

Arthur was on his way to ask what Dylan meant when Arthur heard the goblin whistle and then saw a cart come hurtling up towards them on the little railway tracks in front of them. With dread in his stomach Arthur climbed in after Dylan and the goblin. Something told Arthur his brother wasn't joking, and without warning they suddenly went off.

The nausea Arthur felt after Dylan apparated them to Diagon Alley turned out to be nothing compared to the seemingly endless rollercoaster down the maze of twisting passages. If Arthur was in lesser control of himself he could have kissed the floor when the small cart _**finally**_ stopped next to a door in the passage wall after 13 minutes and 47 seconds ride. ( _Arthur kept count_ ). As it was Arthur only threw himself off the cart the moment it stood still and leant against the wall for a while. His legs were not shaking, damn it! He just had to catch his breath a little, that's all. Really.

"Are you alright there, Arthur?" Dylan asked with an amused voice, tinted with just a hint of worry, when he walked over to Arthur.

"I'm fine," Arthur muttered annoyed, took a deep breath and straightened up. The bastard was apparently unaffected by the ride.

Dylan rolled his eyes. "I will only believe it when your face and eyes are not in the same colour any longer."

Arthur cursed Dylan under his breath, but deemed it not worth it to answer and instead chose to focus on forcing his stomach to calm down. When the nausea was down to a bearable level Arthur turned towards the goblin who patiently waited for them beside the door to the vault. Dylan seemed to remember something then, because he took a step forward with an " _oh, right_!" and placed his left hand on a seemingly random spot on the door in front of them. To Arthur the door looked blank with no keyhole or handle to be seen, so to be honest he wasn't sure how his brother was going to open the door, but then Dylan began to mutter something Arthur couldn't hear.

It must have worked too, because Dylan's hand soon began to glow in a mix of blue and green light and with a click the door swung open. Arthur grudgingly admitted for himself it was ( _a little!_ ) impressive. Yet nothing could have prepared Arthur for what he saw when he noticed what was on the other side of the door, and Arthur could only gape at the great mountains of gold, silver and bronze coins in the vault.

"Impressive, isn't it?" Dylan commented with a smug voice.

"This…" Arthur stuttered out. "Is this really only your personal vault?"

"Yes, of course."

He couldn't even begin to imagine what it meant for the family vaults if this really was just Dylan's personal one.  
Dylan clearly took pleasure in Arthur's flabbergasted expression too, even though Arthur's expression soon turned annoyed instead.

"Then why haven't any of you hired a chef? We wouldn't have to risk getting poisoned every time it was time to eat lunch or dinner!"

"Shut it, our food isn't that bad and I don't want to hear anything from the one who almost burnt down the house when he tried to make scones!"

"I'm only 11 years old! Besides, my cooking is still a thousand times better than your lots' food!"

"Watch your mouth, or you'll find all of your clothes striped in bright pink, blue and yellow," Dylan warned grumpily.

Arthur wisely shut up at that, because he knew it wasn't an empty threat, and instead gave a huff of annoyance while he watched Dylan walk into the vault to fill a pouch with a lot of golden Galleons, silver Sickles and bronze Knots.

"That should be enough," Dylan eventually said with a nod and went back to Arthur, closing the door on the way.

With a click the place where Dylan had his hand when he opened the vault glowed in purple for a few seconds before it faded away, and the goblin showed no reaction towards the brothers' previous conversation when he asked if they wanted to visit another vault or if they wished to go back. Dylan told the goblin they wished to go back, and Arthur felt stuck between happy because they wouldn't have to go even further in the cart ( _he hated the fact Dylan had been correct about that_ ), but dreaded the fact they still needed to use the small cart to reach the surface again. Dylan must have taken notice and decided to take pity on him - not that he needed any, mind you - because he fished up a small bottle filled with a suspiciously dark grey liquid from a pocket in his jacket and showed it to Arthur.

"Drink it to stop the nausea."

"You had this all this time and didn't think of giving it to me until now?" Arthur asked him in disbelief.

Dylan shrugged. "I usually don't need any, so I only took it with me just in case. Didn't know you would be so sensitive."

"I'm not sensitive!" Arthur denied red-faced in a mix of embarrassment and anger.

"So do you want it or not?"

Arthur quickly snatched the small bottle from Dylan's hand and soon downed the content of the entire bottle in one gulp while he refused to acknowledge Dylan's knowing smirk. In addition to this Arthur then almost spit it out again the moment he felt the taste, and gagged while he tried to ignore it long enough to keep it down in his stomach.

"It tastes worse than shit, but at least it works. Jump in," Dylan agreed, as if he read Arthur's mind, and climbed into the cart where the goblin already waited for them.

Arthur was thankful when they once again could climb out of the cart, but he had to admit the potion worked as it should and he didn't feel nearly as nauseous the second time. Soon enough they were once more met with the almost sunny June weather, though Arthur noticed more clouds were beginning to close in.

"Well, I suppose we should get your wand at Ollivander's first, since it's the one who is most likely to take the longest time," Dylan commented and began to follow the road on the right side.

Arthur didn't complain since he had looked forward to buy his own wand for a long time and quickly followed Dylan down the road while he listened to what Dylan said next.

"Since Ollivander is at the end of Diagon Alley we can work our way through the shops backwards and then finish the day with a late lunch at The Leaky Cauldron. How does that sound?"

"Whose turn is it to cook dinner today?"

"It's William's turn," Dylan answered with a shudder.

"… The Leaky Cauldron it is then," Arthur quickly agreed.

They slowly made their way through all the shopping people and eventually reached the end of alley. At one point Dylan slowed down a little to walk on Arthur's left side and let his hand lightly clasp Arthur's shoulder while he steered them through the people who were outside doing their shopping. It annoyed Arthur a little Dylan seemed to think he could get lost here. Since it was in the middle of June there were not even many people outside, unlike how it would be in a month or so when everyone else would come to buy the things they needed for Hogwarts.

When they finally reached Ollivander's it looked much smaller and shabbier than Arthur had imagined it would, however Dylan didn't hesitate to enter the door with peeling gold letters, so Arthur assumed they were at the correct shop. Arthur's first thought about the inside of the shop was about how tiny it was, but then he also noticed the dust gathered on thousands of dark grey narrow boxes piled on each other on the shelfs in the shop.

"Good morning," was suddenly softly said, and Arthur snapped around to look at the old man who now stood in front of them behind the register.

"Hello, we are here to buy a wand for my younger brother," Dylan replied calmly.

"Yes, of course. I had a feeling I would see someone from the Kirkland family this year, " Mr. Ollivander said with a knowing nod and turned to face Arthur.

Mr. Ollivander was a kind looking old man with white hair and wide, pale eyes - but no matter how much Arthur tried to disregard the feeling he also felt a bit… creeped out by those unblinking silvery eyes who were now solely focused on him. From the corner of his eye Arthur could see how Dylan walked over to the corner of the shop and sat down on the spindle chair while Mr. Ollivander continued to talk.

"I assume you are Arthur Kirkland, the youngest of the Kirkland brothers. I must say, you look a lot like your brother Merlin Kirkland. In fact you look almost exactly like a younger copy of him."

"Did you know him?" Arthur asked in surprise and now fully focused on the old man in front of him.

"I briefly met him many years ago when he came into my shop and asked me to check up on his wand. Pine, 13 inches and had a core not even I have ever seen before.  
It was a very old, but powerful, wand in perfect condition," Mr. Ollivander acknowledged with a soft smile.

Dylan cleared his throat from the chair in the corner before Arthur could ask more, which in turn also seemed to remind Mr. Ollivander about why the two Kirkland brothers were in his shop in the first place. Mr. Ollivander then took a step back and fished out a long measure tape from his pocket.

"Now then, please show me your wand arm, young Mr. Kirkland."

Arthur quietly showed Mr. Ollivander his right arm and then waited patiently while Mr. Ollivander measured him, everything from shoulder to finger and around his head. While Arthur was measured he could only bring himself to half-listen to Mr. Ollivander's explanations about wands, since Arthur's own head was busy filing away the new information about Merlin Kirkland.

Arthur didn't know a lot about his dead brother since the rest of the Kirkland brothers always looked uncomfortable whenever he tried to ask about Merlin, but Arthur supposed he couldn't blame them, so he stopped to ask those questions many years ago. Unfortunately this also meant the only things Arthur knew about Merlin almost only came from what was written in books, so each time Arthur learnt something new about his dead brother Arthur filed it away in a mental folder he a long time ago named ' _Merlin Kirkland_ '. When Arthur returned from his thoughts it didn't look like a lot had changed either. Mr. Ollivander still talked about wands, how each of them had a powerful magical core and what kind of cores Mr. Ollivander himself used for the wands he made. He also made sure to point out to Arthur how all the wands were unique, just like all magical creatures were unique from each other even if they were of the same species. The only real change since Arthur lost himself in his thoughts was how Mr. Ollivander sometime during the explanations left the measure tape to measure by itself while he moved around the shelves, taking down boxes.

"That will do," Mr. Ollivander finally said, and let the measure tape crumple into a heap on the floor just as Mr. Ollivander walked over with an open box for a wand.

"Right then, young Mr. Kirkland. Try this one. It's made of Maplewood and unicorn hair, 10 inches ( _ca 25,5 cm_ )."

Arthur accepted the wand Mr. Ollivander handed over and gave the wand a little wave. The windows behind them exploded with a bang and Arthur dropped the wand in shock as the glass rained down on the floor at the same time as he heard how Dylan jumped up from the chair and swear loudly in welsh.

"I-I'm so sorry! I didn't mean it to happen!" Arthur stammered with wide and panicked eyes.

However Mr. Ollivander just waved it away with a chuckle and bent down to pick up the dropped wand.

"Don't worry, things like this happens from time to time."

Luckily enough the next wands Arthur tried weren't nearly as dramatic, but he still managed to make a mess in Mr. Ollivander's small shop. The more wands he tried the happier Mr. Ollivander appeared to become though, and Dylan easily restored the shop to how it originally looked each time Arthur made a mess. Yet as the pile of wands Arthur had tried only continued to grow Arthur couldn't help but to begin to worry there might not be a wand which wanted him as a master. Because just as Mr. Ollivander said earlier it was the wand who chose their master, not the other way around. Even so, if there was no wand for Arthur... would he even be able to learn any magic at Hogwarts at all? Arthur's fears about not being able to find a wand seemed to come true when Mr. Ollivander suddenly stopped the onslaught of new wands to try and paused to take a look at him with a thoughtful expression on his face.

"Mr. Kirkland," he directed towards Dylan, but didn't let his eyes leave Arthur. "I do not think any of my normal wands will suit your younger brother."

Arthur's inside turned cold in fear.

"However," Mr. Ollivander continued, "with your permission I would like to let your younger brother try some of my more unusual wands."

"Go ahead," Dylan replied with a shrug, as if he didn't care Arthur might not be able to find a wand. "I suspected it would be needed anyway."

Mr. Ollivander nodded in acknowledgment to Dylan's answer and then hurried to the very back of the shop where neither Arthur nor Dylan could see him. Considering the noises Mr. Ollivander made he just opened a cabinet or a locker though, and it didn't take long before Mr. Ollivander was back in front of Arthur with five pitch-black, narrow boxes with a beautiful stamp of two crossed wands in silver on each one of them.

"What will happen if none of the wands choose me?" Arthur blurted out before he could stop himself.

"Nonsense," Mr. Ollivander chuckled merrily. "Some people are harder to find a wand for than others, but I will make sure you have a wand before you walk home today."

Although Arthur wasn't sure if he felt reassured by Mr. Ollivander's words or not he still decided to give the new wands a chance.

"Now, these wands are extremely powerful and dangerous if handled incorrectly, so you can't just wave them around to see if any of them will choose you," Mr. Ollivander explained in a sudden serious voice. "So what I want you to do is to close your eyes and breathe deeply."

It was an odd request, but Arthur decided to do as he was asked and closed his eyes.

"Now, Mr. Kirkland, I need you to focus on your magic. Try to feel how it flows in your very blood."

Arthur did as he was told and began to feel a pull, as if his magic wanted him to reach out to something.

"Do you feel the pull? Follow it," Mr. Ollivander now told him in excitement, as if he could read Arthur's mind.

"Alright," Arthur muttered back in reply and felt his right hand raise as if it had a will on it's own. He tried to move his hand slightly to the right, but the pull wanted him to go left, so just as Mr. Ollivander told him to Arthur followed it. Unbidden Arthur then felt his hand gently grab what he assumed was one of the narrow pitch-black boxes, and so he opened his eyes. He was correct, and in his right hand he now held one of the boxes while Mr. Ollivander turned around and laid down the rest of the boxes on the counter behind him.

"Open it!" Mr. Ollivander said in eager anticipation.

Arthur did as he was told and carefully opened the lid to the box and found himself looking at a beautiful dark brown, almost black, crafted wand with one thin gold and silver line swirling up from the handle up to the top of the wand. The wand was simply… beautiful. Arthur couldn't help but to stare wide-eyed in awe at it while he took hold of the wand and unconsciously handed back the now empty box to Mr. Ollivander.

"Holly, 12 inches. Special in the way it has not only one, but two, cores. Unicorn hair and Phoenix feather. Try it," Mr. Ollivander told him, but it sounded muffled and far away.

Still in awe of the beautiful wand in his hand Arthur once again did as he was told. When the sudden warmth was felt in his fingers Arthur instinctively gave the wand a trying swish and to his surprise nothing exploded or went wrong. Instead it felt like his very own magic hummed in happiness and in answer the wand shot out a stream of gold and silver sparks into the air which soon transformed into what looked like a roaring lion.

"Bravo young Kirkland!" Mr. Ollivander cried out in happiness. "Magnificent!"

Arthur felt a giddy happiness blossom in his chest, which only spread through his body. He finally had a wand. Arthur allowed himself to smile widely and didn't even jump in surprise when he all of sudden felt a hand pat his left shoulder. When Arthur looked up he was met with Dylan's warm and smiling face.

"About time. It appears like you finally got your own wand, Artie."

Arthur didn't even bother with a retort at the hated nickname and only gave back the wand to Mr. Ollivander with the wide smile still stuck on his face while Mr. Ollivander put the wand back into the box and wrapped it up in brown paper.

"It's curious," Mr. Ollivander commented happily as if Dylan hadn't said anything. "I remember every single wand I have ever sold, young Mr. Kirkland. Yet so far I have only heard my father _once_ sell a wand with more than one core."

Mr. Ollivander handed over the now wrapped box to Arthur's waiting hands with glittering eyes.

"This is one of the most powerful wands I've ever made. I think we can all expect truly great things from you, young man."

Arthur got the odd feeling Mr. Ollivander knew something he didn't, but the feeling was quickly forgotten when Dylan paid for the wand and Arthur followed him out from the shop. Compared to how long it took to buy the wand the rest of the shopping went by relatively quickly, with the exception of when they went to buy Arthur the books he needed in Flourish and Blotts. Dylan was more or less forced to drag Arthur away from the section about magical creatures before they could buy the last of the things they needed, but at least Dylan was nice and bought Arthur a wonderful book about fairies on top of all the books he would need for his first year at Hogwarts. Just as promised Dylan and Arthur then finished their day with a late lunch, on the borderline to early dinner, at the Leaky Cauldron before Dylan apparated them home again.

This was one of the best days in a long time, but Arthur couldn't wait until the first of September.


	5. Ch05 - The Hogwarts Express

The rest of the summer was most likely the best one Arthur had ever experienced in his life. Not only did he more or less learn all of his new books for school by heart, but he also spent his days of summer in the forest surrounding the house and befriended many of the both magical and none-magical creatures living there, including the unicorn heard Scott once told him about. He managed to teach his kitten a few tricks too! Now when it was summer his daily lessons had come to an end as well, which meant Dylan and Scott took turns to be at home and look after him, with the occasional visit from Patrick or William, while the others worked. Patrick and William also made it their personal mission to teach Arthur everything about playing Quidditch, and the moment any or both of them visited they dragged Arthur out into the garden to play. Both of them cursed up a storm when Dylan reminded them first years weren't allowed to bring their own broom or to play in the house-team.

So far the only less pleasant event during the summer was when the frog ( _aka Francis Bonnefoy_ ), an old French friend of Scott, came to visit for two weeks. Francis had been a friend to the family for as long as Arthur could remember, but for some reason Arthur always had a hard time to stand the mere presence of him. It certainly didn't help the frog was an obvious pervert who flirted with all men and women who were unlucky enough to catch his eye. Francis Bonnefoy also had a tendency to always tell him how adorable Arthur used to be, and with hearts in his eyes talk about all the cute ( _read: embarrassing_ ) things Arthur did as a baby. Arthur swore he one day would manage to burn the picture of his three years old self dressed as a bunny! Needlessly to say Arthur wasn't exactly fond of Francis, but Arthur was determined to not let the frog destroy his summer and somehow managed to endure the visit until the frog went back to France and let Arthur enjoy what was left of his holiday.

Time always seems to go much faster during the summer though, and it didn't feel like a long time at all before the first day of September arrived. The morning passed in a blur for Arthur, but he remembered how Dylan said goodbye and actually gave him a short hug before he went to work. It wasn't until Dylan was already out of the door Arthur remembered this was most likely the last time he would see Dylan until the Christmas holidays, and his nervousness only continued to grow after that.

To arrive at the King's Cross station both took longer and shorter time than Arthur expected it to. As mentioned before there was no natural path through the forest around their house, so Scott was forced to first apparate to their apartment in London with Arthur's trunk and Cassie, then come back and take Arthur with him. From the apartment Scott then drove them in his car to the King's Cross station, but by the time Scott finally found somewhere to park the clock already showed 10:24 AM. Even though Arthur logically knew they had more than enough time before the train departed Arthur couldn't help but to want Scott to hurry. They didn't bother with a trolley either – Scott just took the trunk over his shoulder and let Arthur carry the cage with Cassie inside.

"Well, what platform is the train going to depart from?" Scott asked with a grunt as they walked into the station.

"Platform nine and three-quarters," Arthur answered and checked at the ticket again to make sure.

"Haha, very funny Artie. Be serious now," Scott gruffly shot back.

"My name is not Artie, and I AM serious! Take a look for yourself if you don't believe me!" Arthur said angrily and showed Scott the ticket.

"Right. Of course. Great! This is why I hate the wizards, they can't even make normal platforms," Scott began to mutter darkly.

At first Arthur wasn't sure what Scott meant, but he found out soon enough when they stood in front of platform nine and ten.  
According to the ticket there should have been a platform somewhere in the middle of them, but Arthur could only see a wall of brick.

"How do we get to the platform?" Arthur asked nervously.

"How should I know? I didn't go to Hogwarts," Scott reminded Arthur and continued to mutter darkly while he dragged his free hand through his hair in frustration.

"You told me you visited Hogwarts in the past though, didn't you?" Arthur remarked with a hint of desperation.

"Aye, but I just apparated to Hogsmeade and walked the last bit to the castle," Scott shot back. "Read yer ticket again to see if it says anything about what we should do."

Arthur took up the ticket from his pocket again and desperately tried to find anything on it which told them how they were supposed to get to the platform, but there was nothing written.

"Well?"

"There is nothing!" Arthur's voice hitched with a hint of panic.

"Let me look at it," Scott snapped and snatched away the ticket from Arthur's hand and leaned the trunk against the wall to read the ticket.  
Except the trunk didn't stay standing – _it fell straight through the wall and disappeared_.

"My trunk!"

Scott stared at the point where the trunk disappeared and suddenly began to grin. "Of course…"

Without warning he then grabbed Arthur's free hand and forced Arthur to follow him in a run against the brick wall. Years later Arthur would still vehemently deny it, but he let out a cry of surprise and closed his eyes tightly in fear of the impact which was sure to come. Except it never did. Instead Arthur only eventually felt them both come to a stop and when Scott let go of his hand Arthur snapped his eyes open as he stumbled over his trunk. If glares could kill Scott would have been dead now.

"What was that for!? We could have died!"

"Is that the 'thank ye' I get for making sure ye' don't miss yer train?" Scott chortled and picked up the trunk over his shoulder again.

Only now did Arthur take notice of where they were and looked up to see a scarlet steam engine which waited next to a platform full of people.  
A sign clearly said it was the _Hogwarts Express_ , which would leave at 11 o'clock. They had run _through_ the wall.

"Are ye' coming?"

Arthur's attention snapped back towards his brother, who now walked towards the train, and Arthur hurried after him so he wouldn't be left behind. The smoke from the engine drifted over the crowd of people on the platform, cats in all colours ran between all the legs and owls hooted to each other from their cages. Arthur was lucky they were here in time – the first two carriages were already packed with students, who either talked with their families through the windows or fought over seats. Despite this it didn't take long until Arthur and Scott found an empty compartment on the first half of the train near the middle, and Scott made a quick affair of lifting up the trunk for the steps and stow away the trunk in the luggage rack. Afterwards Scott walked out from the train again while Arthur opened the window to talk to his brother before the train left.

"Now, ye' will most likely be unable and too tired to send anything after the sorting and everything, but be sure to send us an owl tomorrow to tell us which house ye' ended up in, or I will never hear the end of it from Dylan," Scott grinned and handed over 5 Galleons to Arthur. "This should be more than enough for ye' to buy lunch on the train and still leave ye' with some money over."

Arthur muttered back a ' _thanks_ ' and pocketed the money, not really sure what else to say.

"Make sure you don't end up in trouble at school either," Scott then said in a more serious voice. "I don't want owls sent home with letters all the time about ye' ending up in trouble."

Arthur snorted. "Why would I end up in trouble?"

"You're a Kirkland," Scott told him with a smirk, as if that explained everything. "Trouble has a tendency to find us no matter if we want it or not."

Sadly enough Scott had a point, so Arthur only nodded back in reply. They then continued to chat for a while ( _Arthur wasn't sure for how long_ ) while Arthur tried to ignore the lump of nervousness in his stomatch, but then Scott all of sudden looked down at his watch and sighed.

"Well, I better get to work before Fudge messes up something at the ministry."

"Aren't you going to stay until the train leaves?" Arthur asked in badly hidden surprise.

"Did ye' want me to stay?" Scott asked with a raised eyebrow, clearly not having expected it.

"Of course not!" Arthur spluttered in embarrassment, but then ( _kind of_ ) began to backtrack.

"I mean, if you want to I will not stop you. It's not like I care what you do!"

However Scott easily saw through his mask and laughed. "As if anyone is going to believe that!"

Arthur felt his face go red and once again began to splutter in embarrassment. It certainly didn't help Scott then reached up and ruffled Arthur's hair, which made sure his hair became even messier than before.

"Hey, stop that!"

To Arthur's annoyance Scott looked even more amused by this, but at least Scott withdrew his hand from Arthur's hair.  
At that moment a whistle also loudly sounded through the air, and Arthur realized the train was about to depart anyway.

"Have a great year. I'll see ye' at Christmas," Scott grinned, backed away from the train and began to wave just as the train began to move.  
"Remember to send us an owl about what house ye' end up in, Artie!"

"My name is not Artie!" Arthur angrily hollered back to Scott as the train picked up speed.

Arthur swore he could hear Scott's laugh even from this distance, but the waving figure of his brother quickly only became smaller and smaller until he completely disappeared when the train rounded a corner. With a huff of irritation Arthur withdrew from the window before he closed it and sat down on the seat, but then allowed himself to smile a little. He was finally on his way to Hogwarts.

It didn't take long until Arthur heard mewing from Cassie's cage, and Arthur took the opportunity to open Cassie's cage to let her stretch her legs in the compartment for a while. Cassie was clearly pleased by his decision and immediately jumped on the seat next to Arthur and stretched before she with a content purr laid down on Arthur's lap to be petted, which suited Arthur just fine. It was relaxing to pet his cat while he let his thoughts wander. For an example, what house would he be sorted in? Personally he thought Ravenclaw seemed like it would suit him, but he supposed Gryffindor or Hufflepuff wouldn't be too bad either. He heard a lot of bad rumors about Slytherin, so perhaps it was best to avoid that house, but surely they couldn't be that bad? Just because Voldemort used to be in Slytherin it didn't mean the rest of the people in Slytherin would also be evil. However Arthur was soon interrupted from his musings when the door to the compartment suddenly opened and Arthur saw a girl with bushy brown hair and large front teeth stand in the opening.

"Excuse me, but is there still an empty seat in your compartment?" she asked with a bossy voice. "A pair of twins was doing loud pranks on the outside of my compartment, so I decided to move somewhere quieter."

"Sure," Arthur answered and gestured to his cat before he continued. "Cassie and I are the only ones in this compartment anyway, so we don't mind the company."

That was only partly true – Arthur had looked forward to spend some time alone before they arrived at Hogwarts, but he wasn't going to begin his time at school with being rude towards a girl - he was a gentleman after all. Besides, it couldn't hurt to get to know someone.

"Thank you," the girl quickly replied and dragged her trunk into the compartment before she closed the door.

Arthur let Cassie down on the seat next to him and then stood to help the girl lift the very heavy trunk. Together they somehow managed to lift the trunk up to the luggage rack, and after she thanked him for the help they sat down on the seats on the opposite side of each other. Cassie was of course quick to climb back into Arthur's lap to be petted.

"I never introduced myself earlier, did I?" the girl questioned with an air of confidence around her and made a move to shake Arthur's hand.  
"I'm Hermione Granger, and I'm about to begin my first year on Hogwarts."

"Arthur Kirkland. I will also begin my first year," Arthur replied with a nod and shook her hand before he gestured towards the cat in his lap. "This is my cat, Cassie."

"Nice to meet you both. Are you really a Kirkland?" questioned Hermione in an eager voice, but didn't wait for him to answer.

"I have read all about your family of course – I bought a few extra books for background reading, nobody in my family except for me have any magic at all you see, and not only did I find out your family always have held high positions in the Ministry of Magic, but your family is also famous for working like a bridge to the non-magical government. On top of that Dylan Kirkland is also acknowledged as _the_ best dragon expert in Britain while Merlin Kirkland is famous for taking out a total of over 200 Death Eaters before he was killed in an ambush by the Death Eaters."

All of this was said so fast Arthur almost had a hard time to follow what she said, but at the same time Arthur was now reminded his family was actually famous in the magical world. He hadn't really understood _how_ famous they were until now though, and it briefly made Arthur wonder if the fame was one of the reasons why he had more or less grown up on the non-magical side of the world. After all his brothers were not exactly very social people most of the time.  
At the moment it was therefore probably a good thing Hermione seemed content to take care of all the talking by herself, because Arthur was not sure what to answer.

"Of course, I did not only read books for background information, I also made sure to learn all our set books by heart. I just hope it will be enough…"

Hermione finally seemed to take a breath, and her last piece of information perked Arthur's interest.

"What did you think about the book written by Newt Scamander?"

"Oh, so you've read it too?" Hermione asked in excitement. "I compared some of the information in the book to others books I bought, and while I found Newt Scamander's facts interesting and mostly correct there were also parts where I couldn't help but to question the information I read, especially since it was so vastly different from what other books have stated as facts before."

"I know!" Arthur exclaimed, eager at the fact he had found someone to discuss the books with.

This was also mostly what the conversation continued to be about for the rest of the hour, although they after a while changed their focus to the many different books they had read. Arthur soon found out Hermione talked much calmer once she began to relax, which in turn made Arthur realize she most likely only talked so fast in the beginning because she was nervous, even if it wasn't easy to see with the confident mask on her face. All in all Arthur found himself enjoying the pleasant conversations with Hermione, and when the conversations began to ebb out both of them took out a book from their trunk and read in comfortable silence with only the occasional comment about what they just read. Perhaps, Arthur thought briefly, he had found a friend.

Just before the trolley with food arrived they took turns to wait outside the compartment when the other changed into the black robes normally wo **r** n by wizards and witches. When they were done eating and Arthur had given Cassie her own food they then began another conversation while the countryside outside the window flew past and began to become wilder. The flat lands were now changed into woods, rivers and dark green hills. It was only much later their conversation was interrupted when a knock on the door to their compartment was heard, and a round-faced boy who looked close to tears entered their compartment.

"I'm sorry, but have any of you seen a toad?"

Both Arthur and Hermione shook their heads and the boy looked like he was about to cry.

"I don't understand how I keep losing him!" the boy wailed.

"What is your name?" Hermione asked in a kind voice.

"Neville Longbottom," the boy sniffled.

"I'm Hermione Granger," Hermione smiled kindly.

"I'm Arthur Kirkland," Arthur greeted as well.

"Nice to meet you, I'm sorry for bothering-" Neville began before his eyes suddenly widened.

"Wait, are you from _THE_ Kirkland family?" Neville asked with a clearly surprised voice.

"Yes…"

Arthur had a feeling this wasn't the last time he would see a reaction similar to Neville's.

"Your family is famous," Neville added wide-eyed.

"Yes," Arthur sighed again.

Perhaps it was a mistake to tell people his name if everyone was going to react like Neville, but luckily enough Hermione saved him from more questions.

"When was the last time you saw your toad?" she asked him, and Neville immediately began to tear up again.

"I first lost him on the station, but my gran found him and I brought him onto the train, so I know he must be here somewhere. I just can't find him!"

"Do you want us to help you look for him?"

Wait, _**US**_? Arthur gave Hermione an incredulous look. Why did she mix him up in this?

"Oh, would you?" Neville asked and looked between Arthur and Hermione with big eyes.

Urgh… It looked like Arthur didn't have a choice in this. It wasn't like he _wanted_ to help Neville, mind you! Arthur just didn't have anything to do right now anyway, so he might as well help the boy find his toad. That was all. It wasn't like he felt sorry for the boy or anything! Really!

"Yes, we can help you look if you want us to," he finally answered.

"Oh, thank you! Thank you so much!"

Arthur stood up from his seat and put Cassie back in her cage, just to make sure he wouldn't need to run around and look for her as well once they found the toad. Cassie let him do it, but it was clear she didn't like this particular decision, so Arthur silently promised he would let her out from the cage again as soon as he was back from the toad-search. When he looked up again Hermione and Neville already stood just outside the compartment and waited for him, so Arthur hurried outside and closed the door behind himself.

"Since there are three of us it will go much quicker if we split up," Hermione decided. "Arthur, if you go towards the locomotive I will go with Neville towards the end of the train."

Her logic made sense, so Arthur only nodded in agreement before he turned towards his left and began to walk through the corridors while he asked the people he met if they had seen a toad. So far Arthur didn't have any luck though. In the third compartment Arthur only found two red-haired twins chase a gigantic tarantula while a boy with dreadlocks cheered them on. Arthur quickly closed the door again before any of the older boys had the chance to notice he was there. The two girls in the tenth compartment hadn't seen the toad either, but the shy girl with brown, short hair and blue eyes at least wished him good luck on his search. Arthur thanked the nice girl, unlike the rude boy with a pale, pointed face and blonde hair and his two much bigger companions who not much later shoved past Arthur in the corridor on their way in the opposite direction.

Time slowly went by, and eventually Arthur arrived at the last compartment before the driver of the train. By then Arthur figured he wouldn't be able to find the toad, but he still wanted to ask in the last compartment just to be sure. This, of course, meant Arthur soon was making his way back through the train with a toad in his hands to hopefully find Hermione and Neville again. Arthur should have known the toad would hide in the last compartment he went to look in, that was just how things always seemed to work. It didn't take long before he was back at his and Hermione's compartment again, but since neither Hermione nor Neville were back yet Arthur continued down the corridor to the end of the train and began to search for them in the other compartments. Arthur knocked on the door to a compartment near the end of the train and slid open the door.

"Excuse me, but have you seen-" Arthur began, but was rudely interrupted by a red-haired boy with freckles around his own age.

"For the last time, we haven't seen that toad!"

"No, I know. I found him, so I'm looking for the owner," Arthur replied in a flat voice and showed the toad for two boys in the compartment, not impressed by the red-haired boy's manners.

At least the red-haired boy had the decency to look embarrassed. Arthur was just about to ask them again if they had seen Neville and Hermione, but was once again interrupted when three boys shoved him aside and entered the compartment.

"Hey, what was that for!?" Arthur angrily retorted, but the three boys completely ignored him and instead only showed interest for the boy with black hair and glasses in front of them.

"Is it true?" the boy in the middle asked, who Arthur now recognized as the pale boy with blonde hair who shoved past him in the corridor earlier.  
"Everyone on the train says Harry Potter is in this compartment. So it's you, is it?"

Arthur shifted his eyes to the black-haired boy in surprise. He didn't expected this.

"Yes," the boy who apparently was Harry Potter answered and looked at the two much bigger boys on either side of the pale one.

"Oh, this is Crabbe and Goyle," the pale boy commented nonchalantly when he noticed where Harry was looking.

"I'm Malfoy, Draco Malfoy."

Arthur recognized the name – it was also the name of one of the many people from the Ministry Scott usually complained about. Meanwhile the red-haired boy gave away a cough, and Arthur suspected it was a bad attempt to hide a snigger. This meant the attention shifted from Harry Potter to the red-haired boy.

"Do you think my name is funny? I don't even need to ask who you are. My father told me all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles and more children than they can afford to have."

Arthur saw how the Weasley's face quickly turned into the same colour as his hair while Malfoy returned his attention to Harry.

"You will soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don't want to make friends with the wrong sort, and I can help you there."

Harry barely even seemed to look at the hand Malfoy held out.

"I think I can tell who the wrong sort is for myself, thanks," Harry replied with an icy voice.

Arthur didn't need to look at Malfoy's face to know Harry's answer wasn't the one Malfoy wanted to hear. Arthur was correct.

"I would be more careful if I was you, Potter. Unless you begin to become more polite you'll go the same way your parents did."

"Maybe if you weren't such a git you would actually deserve the politeness," Arthur commented coldly.

It seemed all of them forgot Arthur was still there, because Malfoy even jumped a little in surprise at his voice before he turned around to face Arthur.

"And who are you?" Malfoy sneered.

"I don't see how that's any of your business," Arthur replied back even colder than before and saw how Malfoy's eyes narrowed even further.

"I would watch my mouth if I were you," Malfoy threatened. "My father works close to the Minister of magic himself."

"So what?" Arthur challenged. "So does my brothers."

"Liar."

"Do you dare to take the chance?" Arthur challenged.

"You should leave now," Harry added and walked over to stand in front of Malfoy, the Weasley soon standing on Harry's left side.

"We don't feel like leaving though, do we boys? We already ate all of our food and you still seem to have some."

The boy Malfoy earlier presented as Goyle reached out towards the pile of chocolate frogs next to the Weasley and the red-haired boy furiously leapt forward. However before he could even touch the other boy Goyle let out a terrified scream and to Arthur's shock a rat hanged from Goyle's finger, the sharp teeth deep into the knuckle. Goyle continued to howl while he desperately waved and swung around his arm to shake off the rat, and Malfoy and Crabbe quickly took a step back. When the rat finally lost hold of Goyle's hand it flew off and hit the window while the mean trio immediately ran away. It didn't take long until more footsteps towards Harry's and the Weasley's compartment could be heard though, and not even a second later Hermione came inside.

"What has been going on in here?" she questioned and then noticed Arthur.

"Arthur, there you are! I was searching for you, and I see you found Neville's toad."

Arthur looked down on the toad still in his hands. He almost forgot he still carried it. Meanwhile the Weasley walked over to the rat and picked it up by his tail.

"I think he has been knocked out," he told Harry, but took a closer look. "No. I can't believe it, he's gone back to sleep!"

Indeed, that looked like it was the case. To be honest Arthur didn't even know rats could snore, but he supposed you learnt something new every day.

"It's your rat then?" Arthur asked, but could already guess the answer.

"Yes, unfortunately, but at least he did something useful for once. I'm Ron by the way, and this is Harry," Ron answered and gestured towards Harry.

"Arthur Kirkland," Arthur replied and prepared himself for the worst.

"Whoa, you weren't just lying to scare away Malfoy then! Is the red-haired Kirkland who works with Fudge really your brother?" Ron asked in awe.

"Yes, that's Scott," Arthur nodded.

"And is THE dragon expert Dylan Kirkland himself also your brother?"

"That's my oldest brother, Dylan," Arthur confirmed.

"Haha, I want to see Malfoy's face when he realizes he picked a fight with a Kirkland," Ron laughed, while Harry just looked confused.  
"Don't worry, I will explain it to you later," Ron reassured Harry. "By the way, have you met Malfoy before? You seemed to know each other."

Arthur listened while Harry explained to Ron how he met Malfoy in Diagon Alley when he bought his new robes.  
The further Harry went into his explanation the darker Ron's mood appeared to become.

"I've heard of his family. They were among the first ones to switch sides again after You-Know-Who disappeared. They told everyone they were bewitched, but my dad doesn't believe it. He says Malfoy's father didn't need an excuse to join the dark side."

Then Ron then turned around towards Hermione. "Can we help you with something?"

"You better hurry up and change into your robes, I was just up the front and asked the driver, and he says we're nearly there. You haven't been fighting, have you? You'll be in trouble before we even get there!"

Maybe Arthur only imagined it, but Hermione looked slightly disappointed once her eyes shifted to his own.

"We didn't fight," Arthur assured her.

"Scabbers did the fighting, not us," Ron said with a scowl. "Are you going to leave while we change or not?"

"Alright. I only came in here because I searched for Arthur," Hermione said with a sniffy voice. "And you've got dirt on your nose, by the way, did you know?"

Arthur ignored Ron's glare at Hermione when she left the compartment.

"I suppose I'll see you later," Arthur nodded to them and followed Hermione.

There were a lot of people racing up and down the corridors, which made it hard to see where Hermione went, but Arthur finally caught up with her close to their compartment.

"Can you believe him?" Hermione huffed in irritation when she opened the door to their compartment. "That boy had absolutely no manners!"

Arthur agreed, but he didn't have the time to answer before an excited shout cut off their conversation.

"Trevor!"

Apparently Neville waited in their compartment while Hermione searched for Arthur and was now quick to grab his toad.

"Thank you so much Arthur!" Neville exclaimed with a cry of happiness, and Arthur felt his face begin to turn pink in embarrassment.

"Just make sure to keep an eye on him in the future, will you?" he grumbled and sat down on the seat he sat on before, only to hear a voice echo through the train who told them they would reach Hogwarts in five minutes.

With that Neville hurried back to his compartment while Hermione and Arthur quickly packed away the books they read earlier. He would never admit it, but the nervous lump in Arthur's stomach only seemed to grow bigger for each passing second now. Hermione hid it well, but Arthur could tell she was beginning to become nervous as well. The train soon began to slow down and eventually came to a stop outside a tiny and dark platform. Together with the rest of the students Hermione and Arthur tried to get out of the train, and eventually they also succeeded. Arthur wasn't sure what the time was, but the sky was already dark and he could see some of the students shiver in the cold air while he and Hermione pushed forward in an attempt to find out where they were supposed to go.

"Firs'-years! Firs'- years over here!"

Arthur looked up and saw a gigantic man with long, shaggy mane of hair and a tangled beard who held a lamp and towered over the many students.

"C'mon, follow me! Are there more firs'-years? Mind yer step now! Firs'-years, follow me!" the man shouted out over the heads again just as Arthur and Hermione reached the tall man.

The ground was slippery, and Arthur was pretty sure he saw Neville slip twice while they followed the gigantic man down a steep and narrow path. It was too dark to see much of their surroundings, but Arthur thought he saw the path being surrounded by trees. Finally the gigantic man in front of them began to slow down though.

"Yeh'll get your firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec," the gigantic man called out in his the loud voice over his shoulder. "Jus' around this bend here."

After a turn the narrow path suddenly opened to the edge of a great lake and Arthur could hear sounds of awe around him from the other students.  
There, on the other side of the lake on top of a mountain with sparkling windows, was a beautiful great and old castle made of stone.

"Welcome to Hogwarts!" the gigantic man cheerfully boomed out, and Arthur could only stare in awe.

They were finally here.

o.o.o.( **End of Chapter 05** ).o.o.o

 **Author Note: This is already chapter 05 everyone, and I hope you enjoy this fanfiction! Next chapter will be the sorting.  
Once again, thank you so much for the reviews **TheOneYouForgot **! It feels great to see people enjoy what I write.**

 **Thank you to everyone else who read this as well, I hope you enjoy my fanfiction! I hope to see you all the next chapter. / / Jezzica**


	6. Ch06 - The Sorting

If it was something Arthur was happy about it was the fact it was a calm evening, because it turned out all the first-years were supposed to travel across the great lake by a fleet of small boats. The gigantic man, who Arthur finally found out was named Hagrid, called out for them to take a seat in the boats with no more than four of them in each. Arthur thought he saw Harry and Ron sit down in one of them, but couldn't be sure since the darkness made it hard to see. Just a minute later he and Hermione found Neville again, which was a good thing for Neville. Arthur was just barely able to save Neville in time from falling into the lake when the unlucky boy once again slipped while he tried to climb into the little boat. Just to be on the safe side it was therefore decided Neville would sit in the middle, while Hermione took the seat in the front and Arthur sat down on the seat behind Neville.

"Excuse me, but is this seat taken?"

They all turned around to face a short girl with brown eyes and light brown, on the border to dark blonde, hair to her shoulders.

"No, it isn't," Arthur answered her. "You're welcome to sit with us if you want to."

The girl seemed to take a breath in relief. "Thank you!"

She quickly climbed inside and took the seat behind Arthur and barely had the time to sit down before Hagrid began to shout from his own boat.

"Everyone in? Right then, FORWARD!"

Immediately Arthur felt the small boat make a barely noticeable jerk before it began to glide across the lake. It didn't take long until the boat reached the middle of the lake, and Arthur noticed how Neville nervously clutched both sides of the boat to make sure he didn't fall into the lake. Wait, both sides? Then how did he hold…?

"Neville," Arthur began warily. "Where is your toad?"

They were told to leave their luggage on the train since it would be taken to the school separately, but Arthur doubted Neville owned a cage or something similar for his toad, which meant he would have been forced to take the toad with him anyway. So when Neville's head snapped back to look at him with widened eyes Arthur already knew the answer to his question.

"Not again…" Neville whimpered and began to frantically look around the boat. "Why does he keep disappearing?"

"I'm sure he will show up," Hermione reassured Neville gently.

"Yes, but what if he doesn't?" Neville wailed. "Oh, I wish I had asked for a turtle instead of a toad. At least it wouldn't have been able to run away from me all the time!"

Somehow Arthur seriously doubted it, but wisely kept his mouth shut.

"Heads down!" Hagrid suddenly yelled, and Arthur realized their boat already reached the cliff the castle stood on.

However Neville didn't seem to have heard Hagrid, or seen the low cliff, since he was too busy with the search after his toad, so with a curse Arthur quickly moved forward and pressed down Neville's head just in time before it painfully would have made contact with the stone. After many stuttering thanks from Neville the boats got past the low cliff and continued to carry them through a curtain of ivy, which hid a wide opening in the cliff-face. The boats then slowly glided over the water in silence and only took them deeper into a dark tunnel, which eventually led them to what looked like underground harbor. Arthur guessed they currently must be right underneath the castle. Once the boats stopped everyone carefully climbed out from the boats again, and Arthur made sure to keep an eye on Neville in case the boy slipped again. Like the gentleman he was Arthur also made sure to offer both Hermione and the unknown girl who sat behind him a hand to climb out from the boat, but in the end the only one who needed any help turned out to be Neville.

"T-Thank you," Neville stuttered nervously.

"Don't worry about it," Arthur muttered back and began to walk over to where the rest of the students and Hermione were waiting for them.

"Oy, you there! Is this your toad?" Hagrid suddenly loudly asked Neville and held up…

"Trevor!" Neville cried out in happiness and held out his hands to once again have his toad back.

After everyone finally were out from the boats they followed Hagrid and his lamp up for a passage in the rock and came out on a lawn of damp grass in the shadow of the castle. They walked up for some stone stairs and then found themselves crowded around a massive front door of oak.

"Are everyone here? Good."

Hagrid knocked three times on the door of the castle with his gigantic hand, which was opened at once by a stern-looking, tall witch with black hair and emerald-green robes. Arthur's immediately understood this was not a woman you wanted to anger.

"The firs'-years, Professor McGonagall," Hagrid presented them.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here," she replied with a nod and opened the door wide before she began to lead them into the Entrance Hall.

The Entrance Hall was of such impressive size Arthur was sure they could fit a house inside of it if they wanted to, and like in Gringotts the walls of stone were only lit up by the fire from the torches. The ceiling was so high Arthur couldn't even see where it ended, and facing them was also a beautiful staircase of white marble which led to the many floors above. However despite everyone's awe they didn't have the time to stand still and take a look for long, because Professor McGonagall never stopped to walk and they were forced to hurry after her to even keep up with her speed. Thankfully they didn't have to walk very far and it didn't take long until Professor McGonagall led them past a doorway to their right, from where Arthur could hear hundreds of muffled voices behind, ( _Arthur suspected the rest of the school were already there_ ), and into a small, empty chamber. The chamber became a little cramped and everyone were forced to stand much closer to each other than what Arthur normally was comfortable with, but he consoled himself they most likely wouldn't need to stand here for very long. At least Arthur hoped so, because he didn't have the heart to do anything about the fact Neville currently stood on his left foot. Once everyone were inside the chamber Professor McGonagall cleared her throat to speak.

"Welcome to Hogwarts. The start-of-term banquet will shortly begin, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall you will need to be sorted into your houses.  
During your time here at Hogwarts your house will be something like a family. You will have your classes together and then also sleep together in your house dormitory."

Arthur nodded to himself. He already knew about most of this from his books, but it was good to be reminded of everything, because Arthur was pretty sure his nervousness had been given a life of it's own in his head and deleted everything he knew.

"For those who don't already know the four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin," Professor McGonagall continued.  
"Each house has their own noble history and all of them have produced many great witches and wizards throughout history. During your stay at Hogwarts your achievements will earn you points for your house, while any breaking of the rules will instead make you lose them. The house with the most points at the end of the year is then awarded by the great honour of the House Cup, and I expect each one of you to do your best to make your respective house proud."

She took a brief pause here and looked out over the sea of students in front of her.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school, so I suggest all of you try to smarten up as much as you can while you wait."

This time her eyes came to rest on Ron, who stood together with Harry in front of Arthur. When Professor McGonagall's gaze left them Arthur saw how Harry tried in vain to flatten his hair a little while Professor McGonagall continued to talk.

"I will return when we are ready for you. Please wait here quietly."

She then left the chamber and from Arthur's right side Hermione discreetly leaned over to Arthur.

"Do you happen to know how they will sort us? I couldn't find anything about it in my books," Hermione asked quietly with a hint of nervousness in her voice.

"No, I have no idea," Arthur admitted in a whisper.

His brothers never went to Hogwarts, but because of their work in the Government and the Ministry they knew everything which was going on anyway. No matter how many times Arthur asked about the sorting they would just smirk and refuse to tell Arthur anything about it though. Sometimes Arthur wasn't sure if it was a blessing or a curse to have older brothers. Then Arthur heard Ron answer the same question to Harry, and Arthur began to become even more nervous at the mention of having to do a test.

Sure, Arthur more or less learnt his books by heart during the summer, but he had never been allowed to practice the spells. Would it be enough to only know the spells in theory? Hermione seemed to hope so, because she quickly began to whisper all the spells she knew and sort them by how useful they might be. Arthur was almost about to do the same, but when several people behind him suddenly screamed Arthur instead snapped around with a yelp of surprise to see what was going on. It turned out about twenty pearly-white and slightly transparent ghosts glided through the wall into the chamber, and with a whimper of fear Neville jumped behind Arthur and clutched his robes tightly. Apparently the ghosts were in the middle of a heated discussion though, because they didn't even seem to notice the shocked first-years below them.

"I say we forgive and forget," a ghost who looked like a fat little monk said. "We ought to give him a second chance-"

"My dear Friar, haven't we already given Peeves all the chances he deserves? Peeves gives all of us a bad name, and he is not even a real ghost, you know. I say- Hm, what are you doing here?" The ghost with ruff and tights suddenly cut off and looked down at them.

Nobody answered.

"New students!" the Fat Friar smiled down at them. "I suppose you're about to be sorted?"

Arthur was one of the few students who mutely nodded in answer.

"I hope to see you in Hufflepuff, my old house," the Fat Friar smiled kindly.

They were saved from answering the ghost when a sharp voice interrupted.

"Move along now! The sorting ceremony is about to start."

Professor McGonagall had returned, and her words seemed to be the only thing the ghosts needed to know, because one after one they floated away through the opposite wall and disappeared while Professor McGonagall told all the first-years to form a line and follow her. As Arthur got into the line behind Hermione and Neville ( _it felt easier to keep an eye on the poor boy that way_ ) he almost wished the ghosts were back so he wouldn't have to follow Professor McGonagall out from the chamber and back across the hall. From the corner of his eyes Arthur could see how Harry nervously looked around and how Ron's face almost looked white in the dim light, but Arthur brought back his attention to what was in front of him when they walked through the doors into the Great Hall.

Until now Arthur had never seen such strange and impressive place. Thousands of candles were lit and floated in the middle of the air over four long tables, where Arthur saw the rest of the students sitting. The tables were laid with golden plates and goblets which glittered in the light. At the top of the Hall there was an additional long table where the teachers sat. This was also where Professor McGonagall led them, so they soon came to a halt in a line facing the rest of the students with the teachers behind them. Hundreds of faces stared up at them and Arthur couldn't help but to feel the knot in his stomach tighten. In an attempt to distract himself he tried to listen while Hermione whispered an explanation to Neville how the star-dressed ceiling was bewitched to look like the sky outside.

Once all of the first-years stood in a line Professor McGonagall shortly left them and then came back with a four-legged stool, which she silently placed in front of the first-years with a pointed wizard's hat on top. The hat was frayed, dirty and looked like it had been used for a very long time. Arthur briefly wondered if they were supposed to summon a rabbit or something from it, like the "muggle-wizards" sometimes did in their TV-shows, but dismissed the idea when his brain remembered summoning spells like that were classed as very difficult spells. At the same time everyone else in the Hall still seemed to be staring at the hat, so it was obvious something was supposed to happen with it. With a calming breath Arthur therefore decided to wait and see what would happen. The next few seconds in the Hall was completely silent, and Arthur was almost beginning to wonder if something had went wrong when the hat suddenly twitched. A rip opened up like a mouth close to the brim of the hat, and then the hat began to sing.

The hat first began to sing about itself, but then continued to sing about the four houses and their founders. It didn't take long for Arthur to realize the only "test" they would need to do was to try the hat on their heads, and Arthur took a deep breath of relief when the hat finished his _(?)_ song to great applauses from the whole Hall. When the hat had bowed to the four tables it once again became still and Arthur almost wanted to laugh when he heard Ron furiously whisper to Harry about how he was going to kill someone called Fred, who Arthur assumed to either be a friend or brother, for telling him they would need to wrestle a troll. They were still forced to do this in front of the rest of the school, but at least they would only need to try a hat. Nevertheless Arthur would be lying if he didn't admit he was still nervous when Professor McGonagall stepped forward with a long roll of parchment in her hands.

"When I call your name I want you to put on the hat and sit down on the stool to be sorted," she said and then immediately called the first name on the list.  
"Abbott, Hannah!"

A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails nervously stumbled out from the line, put on the hat - which was too big and fell down over her eyes - and sat down on the stool.  
There was only a short pause before the hat shouted out:

" **HUFFLEPUFF!** "

The table on the right broke out in cheers and clapped loudly while the girl, Hannah, went and became greeted by her new peers as she sat down. Arthur even saw one of the ghosts they met in the chamber earlier, the Fat Friar, happily wave to her.

"Bones, Susan!" Professor McGonagall continued, and another girl came forward to try on the hat.

Once again the hat shouted " **HUFFLEPUFF!** " and Susan hurried off to sit next to Hannah. However the next two students were sorted into Ravenclaw while "Brown, Lavender" soon became the first new Gryffindor. At the hat's announcement the table to the far left exploded in loud cheers, and Arthur almost wanted to cover his ears at the volume. Afterwards "Bulstrode, Millicent" became the first Slytherin, and this time it was the table between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff which exploded in cheers.

The more names who were called out, the more nervous Arthur became. He dimly noticed how the hat sometimes took shorter or longer time to sort someone, depending on the person, but otherwise found himself too occupied by his own nervousness to really listen where the other first-years were sorted. That is, until Goyle, one of the boys on the train with Malfoy, was sorted into Slytherin and Professor McGonagall called out…

"Granger, Hermione!"

Arthur tried to give her a reassuring smile when Hermione left the line with a glint in her eyes, almost ran over to the stool and then eagerly jammed down the hat on her head. It took almost four whole minutes, but eventually the hat loudly shouted out " **GRYFFINDOR!** " and Hermione happily jogged towards her house.

The next girl, "Greengrass, Daphne", was then quickly sorted into Slytherin before "Hopkins, Wayne" and "Jones, Megan" became new members of Hufflepuff.  
It couldn't be many more names before…

"Kirkland, Arthur!"

… it was his turn now. Arthur tried to swallow the lump of nervousness and left the line. The walk towards the stool suddenly seemed endlessly long, and the whole Hall broke into excited whispers while they all stared at him.

"Did she say Kirkland?"

"A Kirkland? Here?"

"Does that mean he's related to-"

"He must be the first Kirkland at Hogwarts for centuries!"

Maybe it was only his imagination, but even Professor McGonagall seemed to look at him with great interest. The only thing Arthur found pleasure in about this was when he caught sight of Malfoy's flabbergasted face from the corner of his eyes, but otherwise it was almost a relief when he finally reached the stool and the hat went down over his eyes so he no longer saw everyone else in the Hall.

' _Hm, interesting_ ', a voice quietly said in his ear without warning. ' _You will be difficult to place._ '

Arthur held his breath while the hat continued.

' _You have a lot of courage and pride yourself as a gentleman, but also a great mind with a thirst for knowledge. There is plenty of talent hiding in you as well, just waiting to be unleashed. You're loyal too, oh yes, but not blindly so - and only to those you deem worthy of your loyalty. A lot of pride too, I see, and plenty of ambition. So where should I place you?_ '

The hat continued to hum in deep thoughts for a long time, which made Arthur even more nervous than he already was. What was taking so long?  
Surely he couldn't be _that_ difficult? Arthur wasn't even sure how long he had been sitting here by now, but it sure felt longer than he watched Hermione sit with the hat.

' _What houses are you considering?_ ' he finally decided to ask the hat.

' _Well, all of them really_ ', came the quiet answer. ' _I did say you were a difficult one to place after all. You have traits suited for all of the houses, but I'm unsure what part of you I should base your sorting on._ '

Arthur had no idea what that was supposed to mean, but maybe he wasn't supposed to.

' _Hm, I think I know where you belong now._ ' The hat then finally told him quietly. ' _It better be…_ '

" **SLYTHERIN!** "

The last word was shouted out loudly for the whole Hall to hear and the resulting explosion of cheers from the table between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff was so loud Arthur almost thought he would go deaf. With a shaky breath of relief of finally being sorted Arthur took off the hat and began the walk down to his new House. In the midst of all cheering Arthur thought he heard someone yell what sounded suspiciously like " **Hell yes, we got Kirkland!** " just before he sat down at the table a good distance away from Crabbe and Goyle.

"Congratulations!"

Arthur barely had the time to sit down before he received a hard clap on his back and only barely managed to stop himself from face-planting the table in time.

"Be careful, Jack!" someone scolded the one who Arthur assumed was the one who clapped him on the back.

Arthur looked up to see a cheerful-looking boy perhaps two or three years older than himself with a somewhat short and light brown/dark blonde hair, tanned skin and brown eyes now sitting next to him.

"Don't worry, Kirkland is one of us now – he can take it!" the boy, who apparently was called Jack, cheerfully answered a girl with light blue eyes and long, brown hair pushed back into two braids.

"Jack White, to your service!" Jack then presented himself as he turned back towards Arthur and happily shook his hand.

The girl gave away an exasperated sigh and looked past Jack to Arthur. "I apologize for Jack. He's an idiot."

"Hey, that's cruel JJ," Jack chuckled, not seeming to take it too seriously.

"Don't listen to his ridiculous nicknames either, I'm Jade Jackson," Jade directed towards Arthur with a small smile. "Welcome to Slytherin."

Arthur nodded and got out a hoarse " _nice to meet you both_ ", still trying to catch his breath, while the hat sorted the next student into Ravenclaw ( _Arthur didn't catch her name though_ ) and Neville was called forward. Thankfully this caught the attention of Jack and he let go of Arthur's hand, allowing them both to focus on the sorting again. Unfortunately it didn't look like Neville's bad luck had ended and Arthur winced in sympathy when the unlucky boy tripped on his way to the stool. As if that wasn't enough Neville also forgot to take off the hat in his rush to get away when he after a long time finally was sorted into Gryffindor. Poor Neville was forced to jog back with the hat in the middle of the laughter from the rest of the students before he could go and join his new comrades in Gryffindor.

When it was Malfoy's turn the boy confidently swaggered forward and the hat barely had the time to land on his head before it, to Arthur's exasperation, placed him in Slytherin. Malfoy looked extremely pleased with himself as he joined his friends Crabbe and Goyle, but Arthur wasn't sure he liked the calculating look he saw on Malfoy's face once their gazes met over the table. Soon Arthur looked away to follow the rest of the sorting instead, not wanting to deal with that at the moment. There weren't many people left to be sorted now either, which Arthur was thankful for. He didn't realize it earlier, but now when the nervousness was disappearing he could feel how hungry he was.

"Potter, Harry!"

If Arthur thought there were a lot of whispering when his name was called out it was nothing compared to the ones which broke out at Harry's name. While the black-haired boy from the train walked forward Arthur couldn't help but to feel sympathy for him. Arthur knew how felt to be exposed like that, although he at least didn't have to deal with the majority of the hall craning their necks to get a good look at him. Once again it took a while, and even from this distance Arthur could see how Harry pinched his face together, as if he focused very hard on something.

The cheers when the hat finally shouted out " **GRYFFINDOR!** " were deafening and never seemed like they would end. The red-haired twins Arthur saw chase a tarantula on the train were yelling " **We got Potter! We got Potter!** " and didn't calm down until Professor McGonagall called out the next student. It didn't take long until they then reached "Ratchford, Briana", who was placed in Hufflepuff, and suddenly there were only four persons left to be sorted. Ron was soon sorted into Gryffindor, the shy girl from the train - who Arthur now learnt was Katlyn Westner - became a Slytherin and happily sat down on Arthur's left side while Tina Willson became a Ravenclaw. The last one, Blaise Zabini, then also became a member of Slytherin before the sorting was finally over. Professor McGonagall took away the stool and the sorting hat at the same time as Headmaster Professor Dumbledore stood up to speak. The man beamed down to them with open arms, as if nothing could have pleased him more than seeing them all.

"Welcome to yet another year at Hogwarts," he said. "Before we begin the banquet I would like to say a few carefully chosen words, which are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you."

Professor Dumbledore sat down again and everyone began to clap and cheer. Arthur wasn't sure how to react, and apparently he wasn't the only one.

"Is this normal?" Katlyn Westner questioned, sounding a little unsure.

"Define normal," Jack countered with a laugh from Arthur's right side. "Don't worry though, this is pretty normal for him. Chicken?"

To Arthur's surprise the dishes in front of them were suddenly filled with all kinds of food, which seemed to amuse Jack greatly. Everything from roast beef, chicken, pork and lamb chops, sausages, bacon and steak to Yorkshire pudding, vegetables, boiled and roasted potatoes were on the table, and Arthur felt his mouth quickly water in anticipation as he piled his plate with food.

"So what's your story?" Jack asked without warning.

"I beg your pardon?" Arthur questioned, a tad confused.

"Everyone who has even a tiny bit of magic among their relatives know the Kirkland family hasn't gone to Hogwarts for centuries. So how come you're here at Hogwarts?" Jack asked with curiosity and ate another potato.

Arthur shrugged. He hadn't really thought about it himself. "The day before I received the letter my brothers asked me if I wanted to go, and I said yes."

The answer seemed to satisfy Jack, because he began to grin happily.

"You made the right decision! Some of the classes are boring like hell, but I wouldn't change my time on Hogwarts for anything in the world."

"I think I look forward to Potions and Charms the most," Katlyn smiled brightly, and Arthur was surprised this was the same girl as the one on the train who shyly wished him good luck in his search for Neville's toad.

"Potions is great, but Professor Snape is a biased little git with greasy hair. It's not too bad since it's usually us he favors, but it doesn't make it easier for us to become friendlier with Gryffindor, since they're often the ones who have to take the shit instead," Jack commented thoughtfully in reply, but then laughed.

"However since Gryffindor and Slytherin always have Potions together you can be sure something always will happen. JJ and I are in the same year as the Weasley-twins, so you can count on them always coming up with something fun!"

"What do they do?" Katlyn questioned.

"They're the prank-masters of this school, always up to something new," Jack chuckled and turned to point at the two red-haired twins Arthur saw chase the tarantula on the train.  
"Do you see those two? That's Fred and George Weasley. Professor Snape has probably given them more detentions than what he has given the rest of the school combined, which really should say something, but that never stopped them."

So that must be the Fred who Ron wanted to kill earlier, Arthur realized. It looked like Ron also knew the curse of older brothers.

After everyone had eaten everything they could the leftovers vanished into thin air and left the plates just as clean as before they had eaten, only for the desserts to appear a moment later. Puddings, blocks of ice cream in all the flavours you could imagine and all kinds of pies appeared together with treacle tarts, jam doughnuts, trifle, strawberries, chocolate and cream cakes. To Arthur's delight he even found a plate of scones, which he immediately helped himself to. At the same time Arthur also ended up in a discussion with Katlyn about her family.

"My parents always knew I was special, but it was still a big surprise when I got my letter," Katlyn told Arthur happily.

"At first they thought it was a joke when Professor McGonagall arrived with the letter and told us I was accepted into a school for magic, but they quickly changed their mind when she turned our dinner table into a pig and back."

Jake, who must have been listening, choked on his water in laughter.

"How did they react?" Arthur asked in curiosity while he tried to keep his laughter inside.

Katlyn laughed. "Much better than I thought they would. Dad was overjoyed and mum furiously began to scold Professor McGonagall for letting a pig inside when she just had cleaned the floor."

Both Arthur and Jack laughed loudly this time and even Jade seemed to be amused. Katlyn's mother must have nerves of steel if she dared to scold Professor McGonagall after just being told their daughter was a witch and then been showed a demonstration of what magic could do.

"I like your mum already," Jack proclaimed, still laughing.

When everyone were full and satisfied the desserts disappeared and the Hall once again fell silent as Professor Dumbledore rose to his feet to speak.

"Now when we're all fed and watered I have a few things to mention. First off, all of our new students should note it's forbidden for all students to enter the forest on the grounds - and a few of our older students should try to remember this as well."

Dumbledore's twinkling eyes flashed in the direction of the Weasley-twins for a few seconds before he continued.

"I have also been asked by our caretaker, , to remind everyone no magic should be used between classes in the corridors. It should also be noted the Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of the term and if anyone wants to play for their house team they should contact Madam Hooch."

Then Professor Dumbledore's voice without warning became much more serious.

"Lastly I must tell you the right side of the third floor is out of bounds this year to everyone who does not want to die a most painful death."

Even Jake and Jade looked surprised, which quickly told Arthur this was something new even to them.

"Hey JJ, do you know something about this?" Arthur heard Jake whisper to Jade. "Your mum works at the ministry, doesn't she?"

"No, I haven't heard anything about something like this," Jade whispered back while she watched Professor Dumbledore with a thoughtful frown.

However they were all soon distracted when Dumbledore declared it was time to sing the school-song, and everyone hurried to pick their favorite tune to use for the song. Arthur was pretty sure Jack sang the whole school-song to the tune of 'We Will Rock You' by Queen, but the Weasley-twins were the ones who finished their singing last. They sang the whole school-song along to a very, very slow funeral march.

"Ah, music!" Dumbledore said after they finished and everyone clapped. "A magic beyond everything we do here! Now, time to sleep. Off to bed with you!"

Before Jack and Jade disappeared in the sea of the students with a " _See you tomorrow!_ " Jack pointed out the Slytherin's Prefect to Arthur and Katlyn.  
Together Arthur and Katlyn then made their way over to their fellow first-years, followed their Prefect out from the Great Hall and down the stairs to the dungeon.

"Why does it seem like our common room is in the dungeons?" Katlyn questioned Arthur quietly with a yawn.

The yawn was contagious, and Arthur had to fight to not give in to it.

"Someone probably thought it was a great idea," he whispered back.

Everyone was too tired to talk much while they walked through the dimly lit corridors, but from time to time their Prefect would tell them small bits of information, like " _Jump over this stone, it's fake_ ", to " _this corridor is a shortcut to the Great Hall on Fridays_ ", or something similar. Eventually, after what felt like hours but couldn't have been more than a few minutes, their Prefect stopped them in front of a bare and damp stone wall.

"Snakeskins," she said, and a concealed stone door in the wall slid open.

If Arthur wasn't so tired he would probably have appreciated the first sight of the common room he would have for the next seven years a little more, but at the moment Arthur was just too tired to care. Instead of taking in the low underground room with rough stone walls and ceiling he stood in, the greenish lamps which hanged down from chains or the carefully detailed, carved mantelpiece and chairs Arthur only tried his best to stay awake long enough to hear the information their Prefect gave them.

"As you probably have understood by now the current password into our common room is 'Snakeskins', but remember to keep an eye on the bulletin board for the new password since it will be changed every fortnight. The girls' dormitory is down the stairs on the left while the boys are down the stairs on the right side. Breakfast can be eaten between seven and nine o'clock in the Great Hall, and it's also during breakfast tomorrow where you will be handed your schedule for the year."

She smiled down at them. "Before I send you off to bed I only have one last thing to say. Welcome to Hogwarts."

With that they were directed towards their dormitories and with a big yawn Katlyn followed their Prefect down the stairs to the left while Arthur and the rest of the boys took the stairs down to the right. Once they were down the stairs they finally found the room with one four-poster bed with green silk hangings for each one of them, and to Arthur's happiness their trunks and belongings were already brought down. Cassie was already outside her traveling cage and had made herself comfortable near the feet of the bed in the basket he brought for her, and Arthur crouched down to his now almost seven months old cat to scratch her behind the ears. Cassie purred sleepily and then immediately went back to sleep when Arthur rose to his feet. He was just about to prepare himself for bed when he saw Malfoy walk over towards him from the corner of his eyes.

"What do you want?" Arthur asked tiredly, not really caring if he came across as rude at this point, before he turned around to face the other boy.

Malfoy stopped just a meter in front of him, and Arthur still didn't like the calculating look on Malfoy's face.

"I think we got off on the wrong foot earlier, Kirkland. I suggest we start over and forget our earlier misunderstanding - what do you say?"

Malfoy held forward his hand to shake and Arthur was aware how the rest of the boys in the dormitory was listening to every word. It was very tempting to ignore Malfoy's offer of peace, because Arthur knew the incident on the train hardly was just a "misunderstanding", but he wasn't stupid. From now on they would be forced to share a dormitory for the next seven years, and it wouldn't help either of them if they spent those years on each other's throats all the time. With his mind made up he gave a mental sigh and stepped forward to take Malfoy's hand.

"Deal."

They shook hands once, let go and then nodded to each other before Malfoy turned around and returned to his bed. Arthur finally got to change into his pyjamas and sink down underneath the blanket. Maybe this wouldn't hold for very long, Arthur didn't know, but at least for now he and Malfoy had reached a truce. For now.

o.o.o.( **End of Chapter 06** ).o.o.o

 **Author Note:**

 **Well, this was chapter 06, so I hope you like it. I would also like to take this opportunity to remind you I currently only have _08_ chapters uploaded on my account on Deviantart, so once my ff account is caught up with the chapters the updates will take a little longer.  
I promise to do my best to make sure you don't have to wait for too long though, so please be ****patient once that time comes. :)  
**

 **Again, thank you so much for the reviews and for reading my fanfiction! It makes me happy to know people actually like something I wrote!  
** **/./Jezzica**


	7. Ch07 - Stairs and Potions

When Arthur woke up the next day he was aware this was his very first day and time in his whole life he went to school, so of course a few things would be hard in the beginning. The fact Hogwarts was a gigantic castle with over seven floors didn't help things, especially when he was hungry and after thirty minutes _**still hadn't found the damn staircase to the Great Hall so he could eat breakfast already!**_ Who was the idiot who thought it was a good idea with _moving stairs_ in a _school for children_ again? Rowena Ravenclaw, the one who was supposed to be the smart one, did. If she hadn't already been dead Arthur would have killed her for coming up with such a stupid idea, consequences be damned. Obviously none of his earlier murderous thoughts helped his current situation though, and eventually he would be forced to admit he was painfully, utterly-

"Arthur?"

" **I'M NOT LOST!** " he yelled out in frustration, only to turn around and come face to face with none other than Hermione Granger.

To Hermione's credit she didn't even flinch at his raised voice and only rose a single, skeptical eyebrow while a portrait could be heard snickering in the background. Meanwhile Arthur was busy with his desire to sink through the floor and die of embarrassment.

"I guess that explains what you're doing on the third floor then," Hermione commented dryly, clearly not impressed by Arthur's outburst.

 **THIRD floor?** How the hell did he end up on the _THIRD_ floor!? Arthur was pretty sure he only climbed up for _one_ staircase, and that was the one in the dungeon he thought would lead him directly to just outside of the Great Hall. Never mind that though, he needed to swallow his pride and do something about his outburst against Hermione.

"Sorry about that," Arthur muttered and suddenly found his shoes very interesting while he tried in vain to force back the red colour he knew covered his face by now.

"It's alright," Hermione answered with a shrug and gave him a small smile as Arthur looked up in surprise.

"I'm on my way down to the Great Hall for breakfast. Do you want to come with me, or do you want to stay for a while and continue to curse the moving stairs?"

Oh god, did he say parts of his earlier mental rant out loud? Apparently that was the case, since Hermione now knew about his problem with moving stairs. Arthur didn't even know it was possible, but his face flushed an even deeper red than before and was only able to splutter out unintelligible noises in answer. He still followed her though, after sending a deadly glare to the still snickering portrait, and Hermione was quick to throw them into a conversation about a new book she read the night before. Arthur was thankful for the company and distraction she provided – it made it much easier to ignore the staring and the whispers which seemed to follow him wherever he went in the corridors.

"Do you see him? He ended up in Slytherin..."

"Who?"

"The Kirkland kid - you know, the one with the huge eyebrows."

Arthur snapped around to glare at two first-years from Hufflepuff, who at least had the decency to look guilty when they realized Arthur heard them, but he didn't get to do anything else about it before Hermione pulled him away and asked him about what subjects he wanted to learn the most. Their conversation only came to a stop when they arrived to the Great Hall, and despite the fact Arthur earlier spent over 30 minutes in his search for the Great Hall he found out they still had more than enough time to eat breakfast before their first classes would begin. Arthur was just about to say goodbye to Hermione and walk over to Slytherin's table when she surprised him with another question.

"Would you like to meet me in the library when our classes are over? We can compare notes and do our homework together."

"Sure," Arthur accepted the invitation with a happily surprised smile.

It's n-not like he was happy about the invitation, mind you! He just didn't have anything else planned for the afternoon, that's all. Really.

"Good, I'll see you then!" Hermione beamed back and began to walk over to the Gryffindor table with a little skip in her steps.

A little amused and confused over the fact she looked so happy just because he agreed to come to the library with her, Arthur then began to walk over to Slytherin's table for breakfast. Both Jack and Katlyn already sat together and ate while Jade sat a little further away and seemed to have a quiet, but heated, discussion with an older girl who Arthur didn't recognize. Perhaps her older sister? They looked very alike.

"There you are!" Jack grinned when Arthur sat down to his left. "I was beginning to think you got lost or something, considering how late you are even though you left the dorm the earliest of us."

Arthur tried in vain to not blush in a mix of frustration and embarrassment. "Of course not! I just wanted to take a look around."

"Sure, let's say that," Jack laughed, clearly not believing him.

"Who was the girl you talked to?" Katlyn asked in curiosity and handed over the bacon to Arthur.

"Hermione Granger. I first met her on the train to Hogwarts," Arthur replied and added three bacons to his plate before he reached for the eggs.

Jack looked thoughtful. "The girl from Gryffindor? I don't mind it, but you might want to be careful with that one."

"Why?" Arthur asked in surprise. "She's nice."

"I'm not saying you can't be friends with her," Jack smiled. "You should just be a little careful. I was serious when I mentioned the rivalry between Slytherin and Gryffindor last night."

Afterwards Jack and Katlyn went back to talk about whatever they discussed before Arthur arrived, but Arthur couldn't help but to wonder how bad the rivalry must be if Jack felt the need to warn him about it. Even when a man with greasy, black hair to his shoulder came and handed over their schedules Arthur couldn't stop thinking about it.

"That's Professor Snape," Jack explained to Arthur and Katlyn in a whisper once the man was out of earshot. "He's the Head of Slytherin."

Katlyn then took the oppurtunity to check their schedule.

"Looks like we will begin with Defense Against the Dark Arts," Katlyn exclaimed in excitement, and finally broke out Arthur from his thoughts.

"Really?"

Arthur finally decided to take a look at his own schedule and saw to his excitement Katlyn was correct – their very first class was going to be Double DADA, as the class was called. Unfortunately the excitement quickly died out shortly after Jack kindly helped them find the correct classroom for their first lesson, because to both Katlyn's and Arthur's great disappointment Professor Quirrell's lesson turned out to be a bit of a joke. The classroom smelled strongly of garlic no matter where you sat and the whole lesson was more or less spent on theoretical nonsense. As the day progressed Arthur's excitement was only brought back by Herbology with Professor Sprout, lunch and then Charms with the tiny wizard Professor Flitwick. The short man gave away an excited squeak and almost fell off the chair he stood on as he called out Arthur's name when he took the register, but otherwise Professor Flitwick turned out to be a great teacher who was happy to give them a few demonstrations of what they would get to learn throughout the year.

It was a tired, but happy, Arthur who after his classes for the day somehow managed to find his way to the library for his meeting with Hermione.  
( _Hah, take that stupid stairs!_ ) It turned out she was already there, sitting at a table and working on the homework she must have received during the day.

"Hello," he greeted with a small smile.

"You came!"

Why did she sound so surprised? He agreed to come, didn't he? Maybe Hermione just thought he would get lost ( _again_ ).

"Yes, of course I came," Arthur replied, unsure what else he was supposed to say, and sat down beside Hermione before he took out his own homework.

They talked quietly together while doing their respective homework and then, when didn't have any other homework to finish, they began to practice some of the easier spells they knew they would be taught throughout the year. Hermione, who apparently had Transfiguration earlier in the day, also showed Arthur how they practiced turning a match into a needle. Arthur felt almost a little bad when he only could show Hermione his detailed notes from the DADA and Charms lessons, but it turned out Transfiguration was almost the only class who actually did any practical magic this day, and it wasn't exactly the easiest to practice anything for Herbology in the library. Hermione didn't seem to mind though, and she even praised his handwriting for being neat and easy to read.

By the time it was dinner they walked down to the Great Hall together, and Hermione invited him to meet up in the library again the next day before she went and sat down next to Neville at the Gryffindor table. Since Arthur already finished his homework in the library he took the opportunity to walk around the castle after dinner and try to get to know it better ( _so he wouldn't get lost in the future_ ), but eventually he made his way back to the common room, where he decided to take the time to relax and read a book until it was time for bed.

To some people this day might sound boring and uneventful, but it suited Arthur perfectly fine. The next days continued in a similar manner, with the addition of sometimes visiting the owlery to send his brothers a letter or two, ( _Arthur didn't like to admit it, but after searching for hours without finding it he was eventually forced to ask Jack where it was – who was happy to show him the way_ ), and as the days went by Arthur quickly found out magic was _easy_ to use. It was as if magic was already a part of him, just as easy to use as it was to breathe. He couldn't understand why his brothers rarely used their magic at home – it felt so great to use it! The meetings with Hermione in the library also soon became a habit, and the practice they did together was without a doubt also a great help for the both of them. Without thinking too much about it they even exchanged schedules with each other, so it would be easier to meet up in the future. Not that he would admit it aloud, but Arthur also found great pleasure each time he saw Malfoy's envious face when he managed the spell the Professors told them to do within his first three tries.

"We have Double Potions with the Gryffindors today," Katlyn all of sudden commented and took a bite of her sandwich while she examined their schedule for the day closely.

"Yes, I look forward to it," Arthur replied and poured himself a cup of tea. "How about you?"

"Mm, but I hope Professor Snape will not be as bad as the rumors say."

"Don't worry, Professor Snape isn't a particular good teacher, but at least you're not from Gryffindor, so you'll be fine," Jade told them from the seat on the opposite side of Katlyn.

Neither Katlyn nor Arthur were sure if Jade's answer reassured them, but Arthur decided to not worry about it at the moment. They would find out soon enough either way. It was Friday morning, and Arthur could hardly believe he had been at Hogwarts for nearly a week already, and since this would be his first class together with Hermione he was even a bit excited at having Potions, despite the bad reputation their Head of House seemed to have in the school. Once the post arrived Arthur kept an eye open in case any of his brothers had sent back an answer to his latest letter(s), but since it didn't look like this was the case both Arthur and Katlyn soon left the Great Hall and made their way down to the dungeons for the Potions class.

The air was a little colder down in the dungeons, but to Arthur - who was used to the air in the dungeons by now - it felt refreshing from the stagnant air on the floors above. However even Arthur was forced to admit the floating, pickled animals in the glass jars inside of Professor Snape's classroom were a bit creepy. Arthur gave Neville a small wave as he walked past and sat down in the front to Hermione's left with a quiet greeting, while Katlyn took the seat on his other side. As soon as everyone were inside Professor Snape closed the door with an ominous thud, strode forward to the black board and immediately began to take the register. Maybe it was just Arthur's imagination, but when Professor Snape reached his name there was a moment's pause where the man looked up and stared at him with cold and empty black eyes before he continued to call the names. However once Professor Snape called Harry's name the paus was obvious to everyone.

"Ah, yes, another - _celebrity_ ," Professor Snape spoke softly. "Seems like our class will be full of them this year."

Arthur could hear Malfoy and his friends Crabbe and Goyle snigger behind their hands somewhere behind him while Professor Snape finished the register and then looked out over the class.

"Here you will learn the subtle science and exact art of brewing potions," Professor Snape began barely louder than a whisper, but they could still hear every word perfectly.

"Many of you will hardly believe this is magic, because in this class there is no foolish wand-waving. I don't expect any of you to truly understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with it's enchanting fumes, the delicate power of liquids which can seep through your blood, bewitch the mind and ensnare the senses… I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory and even how to delay death. At least if you aren't as stupid as the idiots I normally get stuck teaching."

More silence followed Professor Snape's speech and Hermione sat on the edge of her chair, looking eager to prove she wasn't an idiot.

"Potter!" Professor Snape called out. "What do I get if I add powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Arthur frowned while he tried to recall the answer. He knew he had read about it. Next to him Hermione's hand shot up at once.

"I don't know, sir," Harry told Professor Snape from the seat behind Arthur.

"Pity," Professor Snape said as his lips curled into a sneer and then turned to Arthur, ignoring Hermione's raised hand.

"Kirkland."

"Asphodel and wormwood make a strong sleeping potion known as the 'Draught of Living Death'. It's the most powerful sleeping potion in existence and is very dangerous unless it's used with great caution," Arthur hurried to answer, and gave a mental sigh of relief at having remembered the answer in time.

"Correct," Professor Snape replied with another sneer, and Arthur somehow got the feeling Professor Snape hadn't actually expected him to know the answer, which made him wonder why Professor Snape even asked in the first place.

"Let's try this again, Potter," Professor Snape said and returned his gaze to Harry. "Where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

Hermione's hand shot up again, this time almost leaving her seat in her attempt to raise her hand high enough for Professor Snape to notice her.

"I don't know, sir," Harry answered, and once again Professor Snape ignored Hermione's hand and the badly hidden laughter from Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle.

"Kirkland."

"A bezoar is a stone inside the stomach of a goat and is something which can cure most poisons," Arthur answered and tried to sound confident about it.  
To be honest he couldn't recall exactly what he had read about the bezoar, but hopefully Professor Snape wasn't going to ask for any details.

"Correct again," Professor Snape admitted, this time with just a hint of a smirk in the middle of the sneer.

Perhaps he was warming up to Arthur. Maybe. Nope, not a chance - but you were allowed to dream, right?

"Your last chance to prove you're not a complete dunderhead, Potter. What is the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

This time Hermione stood up from her chair and stretched her hand up as far as she could while Arthur frowned.  
Why did Professor Snape continue to insist giving Harry the questions? It was clear Harry didn't know the answers.

"I don't know, sir," Harry quietly answered. "It looks like Hermione knows though, why don't you try her?"

A few scattered laughs could be heard in the classroom, but they quickly died out at the look on Professor Snape's face. The man clearly wasn't pleased, Arthur noted.

"Sit down," Professor Snape snapped at Hermione and ignored the mixed look of hurt and confusion on her face.

She most likely wondered what she had done to deserve such treatment, and Arthur couldn't help but to wonder the same.

"Fame clearly isn't everything, Potter, but at least one of you had the common sense to open a book before you arrived to Hogwarts. For your information monkshood and wolfsbane is the same plant, which also goes by the name of aconite."

Arthur didn't turn around to look at Harry's face, but he was pretty sure he could make an accurate guess about how it looked right now.

"Well? Why haven't all of you copied down the answers already?" Professor Snape continued, and everyone immediately began to rummage through their bags for quills and parchment.

"Five points will also be taken from Gryffindor for your cheek and laziness, Potter. Maybe this will teach you to open the book and _read_ before our next class," Snape added over the noise before he put them into pairs and told them to mix up a simple potions to cure boils.

Arthur and Hermione were put to work together, Katlyn was paired with a boy from Gryffindor who Arthur heard present himself as Dean Thomas, while Harry and Ron set off to work next to Neville and the Gryffindor boy Seamus Finnigan. Everything went fine for a while, but there was no doubt in Arthur's mind Professor Snape was a difficult teacher to please. He swept around in his black, long cloak and criticized almost everyone except for Malfoy - who he for some reason seemed to like - as they added dried nettles and crushed snake fangs to their cauldrons. Alas this was, as mentioned before, the part of the lesson which actually went well, and it was over the moment acid, green smoke and a loud hissing sound filled the dungeon.

Somehow - though Arthur to this day still had no idea how it happened - Neville managed to melt Seamus' cauldron to a twisted blob. The result? Their potion escaped and now seeped across the floor, burning holes in the shoes of those who weren't quick enough to jump up on their chairs to get away from the potion. It didn't take long until everyone, including Arthur, stood on their chairs. However Neville's bad luck seemed to be contagious, because while the drenched Neville moaned in pain when angry red boils sprang up over his body Arthur without warning slipped and lost his balance. Arthur only had the time to yell out in surprise before he with flailing arms grabbed the first thing he could get a hold of in a desperate attempt to stay on the chair. Turns out cauldrons aren't very good, nor steady, to grab when you're falling off your chair - so not only did Arthur land painfully hard on his back on the floor soaked by Neville's failed potion, but not even a second later his own cauldron filled with his and Hermione's potion also fell over and drenched him in their unfinished potion.

"Arthur!" both Hermione and Katlyn shouted at the same time as his cauldron ( _literally_ ) grew legs and ran away to hide under Professor Snape's desk.

With a groan of pain Arthur then stood up from the floor - his hair and clothes dripping of the two mixed potions - while he both felt and saw sickly green, purple and black boils appear on various parts of his body.

"Idiot boy, none of this would have happened if you hadn't added the porcupine quills before you took of the cauldron off the fire!" Professor Snape snarled angrily at poor Neville who whimpered in pain as boils began to pop up on his nose.

Professor Snape cleaned away all the spilled potions with a wave of his wand.

"Take them up to the hospital wing," Professor Snape then spat at the Finnigan-boy and Hermione, and with a fearful nod Hermione quickly jumped down on the now safe floor and began to lead Arthur towards the door, careful of not actually touching him or his soaked clothes. Neville and Seamus followed closely behind.

Arthur then heard how Professor Snape rounded on Harry and accused him for trying to look good by not telling Neville to not add the quills, which Arthur thought was ridiculous, but couldn't do anything against. Why would Harry even be responsible for what Neville put in his potion in the first place? If anything Professor Snape should have been the one who made sure everyone made the potion correctly. By the time they were out of the classroom Gryffindor had lost another five points though, no matter how unfair Arthur thought it was. This was perhaps also partly the reason why Neville began to cry loudly the moment they were out of earshot from the classroom.

"I'm sorry! I swear I didn't mean for it to happen! I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!"

Neither Arthur nor the others had the heart to be angry at Neville. It had clearly been an accident, and it was not even Neville's fault Arthur slipped and fell down from his chair in the first place. Arthur attempted to tell Neville this, but it turned out boils had begun to pop up on his tongue, which in turn made it difficult to talk, so he opted on to turn around and try to give Neville a reassuring smile instead. He must have failed miserably though, because Neville took one look at him and then began to cry even louder while he begged Arthur for forgiveness. Hermione tried her best to reassure Neville no one was angry at him, but to be honest Arthur wasn't sure if Neville even heard her over his crying. Meanwhile the other Gryffindor-boy, Seamus Finnigan, awkwardly walked beside them and looked like he had no idea what he was supposed to do. Arthur didn't blame him.

Thankfully there weren't a lot of people in the corridors when they got up from the dungeons, since most of them were in class, but there were still too many outside in the corridors for Arthur's liking. They openly stared at them all the way to the hospital wing, and despite Arthur's attempts to glare at them for doing so the effect was drastically lowered because of the many and quite painful green, purple and black boils which by now were all over his face. It didn't help when Arthur and the others realized they didn't even know the where the Hospital Wing was yet, but Hermione was fast to make use of the courage Gryffindor was famous for and asked for directions from a friendly-looking Hufflepuff in her sixth year. The girl was then kind enough to show them the way and only left them once they stood in front of the door to the Hospital Wing.

To her credit Madam Pomfrey didn't even blink at what must have been an unusual sight when they finally entered the Hospital Wing. Instead she just quickly led Arthur and the now only sniffling Neville to two beds next to each other, told them to lay down and then listened when Hermione explained what had happened. When Hermione was done Madam Pomfrey was quick to mix up two slightly different potions for both Arthur and Neville to drink ( _Arthur suspected it was because he had got two different potions over him, instead of only one_ ), which tasted horrible, and told them the boils should be completely gone in 2-3 hours. However she also warned them the side effect of the potions would leave them sleepy and a bit dizzy for at least another three hours after the boils were gone, so therefore Madam Pomfrey would need to keep them in the Hospital Wing over the night to keep an eye on them. It was hardly how Arthur imagined how his first Friday at Hogwarts would turn out and it didn't get better when Hermione was sent back to the Potion class with the Finnigan-boy. At least Hermione promised before she left she would come back and visit them both when class was over and bring them their bags, which they had forgotten in the dungeons.

An hour later the potion had begun to take effect, and just like he had been promised Arthur could feel how the boils were slowly beginning to disappear. Arthur was thankful the ones on his tongue were among the first to go, because it allowed him to actually talk again, and Arthur quietly began to try and reassure Neville it really wasn't his fault Arthur fell off the chair. It was clear Neville didn't believe him though, but it looked like the side effects of the potion Neville drank had already begun take effect, because Neville seemed to have a hard time to keep his eyes open. By the time Hermione returned with their bags Neville had fallen fast asleep, so Arthur and Hermione were careful to keep their voices down while Hermione informed Arthur about the homework they received. Eventually Hermione was forced to leave for lunch though, and Arthur was then left alone to his boredom.

At some point he must have dozed off, because the next time Arthur opened his eyes Katlyn, Jack and Jade were suddenly sitting around his bed and played a game of cards. At the moment it looked like they were playing Go Fish, and for some reason they had decided his legs made a great table.

"What are you three doing here?" Arthur asked sleepily and stifled a yawn.

"Fancy to finally see you awake," Jack grinned in a greeting. "Katlyn told us what happened, and so we decided we couldn't leave one of our own alone and bored on a Friday evening. So here we are, here to keep you company until Madam Pomfrey decides she has had enough of us and throws us out!"

"Which I will do right now if you don't lower you voice," Madam Pomfrey threatened further down the room.

"Sure thing, Madam!" Jack assured her, but forgot to lower his voice anyway.

Madam Pomfrey rolled her eyes, apparently used to Jack's behavior, and then disappeared through the door to her office.

"How are you feeling?" Katlyn asked as she turned back to face Arthur, looking worried.

"I'm fine. Madam Pomfrey just wants to keep me and Neville for the night because of the side effects of the potions she forced us to drink to get rid of the boils."

"She's a great healer, but she can be a little overprotective towards her patients," Jade smiled slightly.

"When I ended up with that concussion and broken leg I was stuck here for a week!" Jack laughed.

"Wha- How did that happen?" Katlyn questioned in surprise.

"This idiot has been one of the Chasers in Slytherin's Quidditch-team since his second year," Jade explained with a roll of her eyes. "The matches against Gryffindor and Ravenclaw went fine, but during the match against Hufflepuff his broom was hit by a bludger and was shattered into pieces. He scared us half to death when he fell from that height."

"Well, let's just say that landing could have gone better too," Jack grimaced and unconsciously rubbed his right leg.

"You haven't ended up in the Hospital Wing because of Quidditch since then though," Jade added with a small smile. "So I guess you at least learnt to be a little more careful."

"Well, I'm not stupid. I rather lose the match than my life," Jack rolled his eyes in amusement, then added with a grin: "We still won the match and the house-cup though!"

"Yes, I know. You wouldn't shut up about it for the rest of the year," Jade snorted, looking amused.

"Come to think about it the flying lessons should begin for you guys soon," Jack said in excitement and turned towards Katlyn and Arthur.

"No, they are _not_ going to try out for the Quidditch-team. First-years are not even allowed to have their own broom," Jade reminded Jack with a stern voice and with a glare which clearly said ' _Don't even think about it_.'

"That's a stupid rule."

Jade ignored Jack's pout while she took up the cards to blend them.

"Anyway, what do you say, Arthur? Do you want to join us for another round of Go Fish?"

Arthur nodded in agreement, and when Neville woke up a while later he was also invited to play with them. After dinner they were even joined by a surprisingly shy Hermione, who after she finished her homework decided to come and visit Arthur and Neville again. Together all of them then spent the rest of the evening playing different games of cards. Well, at least until Madam Pomfrey a few hours later loudly declared Arthur and Neville needed their rest and shooed out the rest of them from the Hospital Wing. By then Arthur was tired again ( _not that he would ever admit it, of course_ ), so he didn't protest too much against it and said goodbye and good night to the others. The Hospital Wing was perhaps not the funniest place to spend his first Friday at Hogwarts in, but Arthur supposed it could have gone worse, and as he listened to Neville's snoring Arthur couldn't help but to fall asleep with a small grin on his face.

o.o.o.( **End of Chapter 07** ).o.o.o

 **Author Note:**

 **I would once again like to thank everyone who read, fave, follow and/or review my story -  
it means a lot to me to know people actually read and like something I've written, so thank you! /Jezzica**


	8. Ch08 - Grounded

Jack was proven correct a few days later – the next Sunday morning Arthur and the rest of all the first-years woke up to see a notice about the flying lessons on the board in their respective common room. Apparently the flying lessons were going to begin the upcoming Thursday, and although more than a few of Arthur's classmates groaned when they noticed they would have the class together with Gryffindor most of them still seemed to be excited over the thought of finally learning how to fly. Arthur couldn't help but mentally admit he also was happy to have another chance during the week to spend more time with Hermione outside of the library.

The next days felt like the slowest days Arthur had ever experienced in his life, and despite Arthur's joy over being allowed to practice more magic during the lessons now he couldn't help but to long for their very first flying lesson. Patrick and William had of course already made sure Arthur could fly well enough from all the Quidditch-training they put him through during the summer, but Arthur still looked forward to fly again. Besides, with all the training he already had it hopefully meant he could fly better than Malfoy.

With the great amount of bragging Malfoy now did about his supposed flying skills you could almost believe the snobby boy had been born on top of a broom, but Arthur seriously doubted Malfoy had flown and escaped "muggles" in helicopters, like he claimed to have done. To be fair Malfoy wasn't the only one who told ridiculous stories after stories about his flying skills, but he was without doubt the loudest one from Slytherins. Nowadays the only times Malfoy didn't loudly brag about his flying skills seemed to be when he complained about the fact first-years weren't allowed to join the Quidditch team, or to have their own brooms. With the exception of Malfoy's little gang most of the Slytherins soon learnt to just ignore him though, even though it was clear Arthur wasn't the only one who was beginning to get tired of Malfoy's bragging. It was very tempting to just punch Malfoy in the face to make him shut up for a while, or to at least give Malfoy something else to talk about, but Arthur didn't actually want unnecessary fights with someone he still was forced to share the same dorm with for the next seven years. So like the gentleman he was Arthur controlled himself. Barely.

When Thursday morning _finally_ arrived Arthur, like usual, walked down to the Great Hall for breakfast together with Katlyn, Jack and Jade. There was a buzz of excitement in the air from the first years in the hall, and even though Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff didn't have their lesson until the next day Arthur suspected they would interrogate their friends from the other houses about the flying lesson the moment it was over. Katlyn had been understandable nervous over the lesson as well – since she was muggle born she didn't have any experience of brooms, but like Hermione she had also tried to read everything she could about it. Katlyn was so nervous Jack and Jade in the end decided to take her outside the evening before their flying lessons would begin and let her try Jack's broom for a while. Arthur wasn't there to see it since he was with Hermione in the library at the time, but afterwards Jack told him with sparkling eyes Katlyn was a natural and should have no problems during the class. Arthur supposed that was part of the reason Katlyn looked so calm and happy now while she ate her breakfast.

However Arthur was soon distracted from his thoughts when he noticed Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle make their way over to the Gryffindor table. With anger rising in his chest Arthur saw how Malfoy stopped behind Neville and snatched something from the boy's hand, and with a scowl Arthur stood up from the Slytherin table at the same time as Harry and Ron jumped up next to Neville. Arthur was fully prepared to walk over and stop Malfoy himself before he noticed Professor McGonagall was already on her way. Reluctantly Arthur sat down again, and saw to his satisfaction how Malfoy was forced to retreat when Professor McGonagall arrived. Not even Malfoy was stupid enough to start a fight when there was a teacher nearby.

The day went painfully slow, and even Arthur found himself distracted from the Charms and Transfiguration class. It was obvious too, because instead of his normal 2-3 tries to get the spell correctly he needed eight of them, which Arthur mentally berated himself for. After lunch he then spent his free period in the library and tried to reassure Hermione everything was going to be fine. Really, flying wasn't that difficult once you got the hang of it, and she would hardly be the only beginner there. Besides, flying wasn't something you could just read about, it was something you had to practice. Arthur doubted he succeeded to reassure her though, because Hermione still spent the whole period reading all her books about flying, again, barely saying a word to him. Again. Unfortunately this seemed to become a pattern lately – Hermione usually read more than she talked, and although Arthur liked to read and do his homework he also wanted to other things. The only time Arthur suggested they could do something else it was loudly rejected though, with Hermione claiming they couldn't just play around when there were still so many things to learn. Ever since then Arthur hadn't suggested they could do something else instead.

When it was time to walk down the front steps to the grounds for their long awaited flying lesson Hermione finally lifted her face from the book, but instead of reading she spent the whole walk down to tell Arthur everything she learnt about flying from the books. Things Arthur tried to tell Hermione he already knew, but never got the chance to say since she talked to fast. In fact she didn't fall silent until they reached the smooth lawn on the opposite side of the grounds to the Forbidden Forest, where they would have the class.

It was a clear, breezy day outside and the grass rippled against Arthur's shoes as they made their way towards the small group of students who were already there. However so far there were only three other Slytherins and the two Gryffindor boys Finnigan and Dean Thomas there. All of them sent them distrustful glances and frowned at Arthur and Hermione as they joined the small group of students, which Arthur returned with a scowl before he decided to just ignore them instead. Hermione must have noticed the glares they received as well, because she frowned in thoughts, looking a little unsure, while she quietly watched their fellow first-years.

An uncomfortable silence followed, so in an attempt to distract himself Arthur looked out over the lawn, where around twenty ancient-looking broomsticks laid in the grass in neat lines. Thankfully enough they didn't have wait for long in the silence though, and soon they could see Malfoy swagger down with his little gang, followed a little further behind by the rest of the Slytherins. Even further behind them the first-years from Gryffindor then could be seen walk down the slope towards the lawn, followed by their teacher, Madam Hooch.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" she barked at everyone the moment they all arrived, not even taking their attendance.

"Everyone stand by a broomstick. Come on, hurry up!"

Everyone hurried over to one of the broomsticks in the lines, and Arthur heard Hermione rapidly mutter through the basics about flying. Despite this she somehow still looked much calmer than Neville, who looked pale as a ghost while he bit on his lip in nervousness on Arthur's left side. Was he shaking too?

"Hey, don't look like that – it'll be alright," Arthur directed towards Neville in a quiet mutter.

Neville didn't look like he believed him, but he seemed to at least have heard what Arthur said since he sent back a barely noticeable nod in answer.

"Hold your right hand over your broom and say ' **UP!** ' in a clear voice," Madam Hooch called in front of the lines of students and broomsticks.

"UP!" Arthur called with everyone else, and felt proud over himself when he, Katlyn and Harry were the only ones who managed to get their broom to jump into their hands at their first attempt.

Hermione's broom only rolled over on the ground and Neville's broom didn't move at all, his voice too mixed with fear. Once everyone held their broom Madam Hooch showed them how to correctly mount their brooms, so they wouldn't slide off the end, something Patrick and William taught Arthur how to do a long time ago.  
Arthur had to stifle a snigger when Madam Hooch walked around, corrected some of their grips, and then told Malfoy he had been doing it wrong for years. It was gold for Arthur's ears.

"When I blow my whistle I want you to kick off from the ground, hard," Madam Hoch said next.  
"Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet and then come straight back down by leaning forwards. On my whistle: three, two-"

However before Madam Hoch had the chance to blow in the whistle Neville, who Arthur later learnt had been terrified of being left alone on the ground, pushed off and immediately began to raise straight up.

"Mr. Longbottom, get down here this instant!" she shouted in vain to Neville, who quickly gained height with no control over his broom.

Neville's terrified white face could only look down on the ground, and Arthur almost swore he heard a timid call for help when their eyes met for only a moment before Arthur like in slow-motion saw how a terrified Neville began to slide off the broom. Without thinking Arthur mounted his own broom and shot away like a rocket from the ground towards Neville. The shouts from the ground were barely background noises in Arthur's head, who was too focused on his attempt to _reach Neville_ before the boy fell off the broom to even notice the order from Madam Hoch to immediately come back down again.

For a short moment it even looked like Arthur would reach Neville in time – he was just below Neville's broomstick and about to grab the handle to lead them back down to the ground when Neville's broom suddenly made a jerk out from Arthur's hold and Neville fell sideways off the broom, right on Arthur. As a result Arthur's broomstick, which was unable to hold the sudden weight of two boys, shuddered and then dropped straight through the sky-

 _ **BANG!**_ With a crash and stars flying before his eyes Arthur felt how his back made contact with the ground and knocked all the air out from his lungs, immediately followed by a painful thud as Neville landed on top of his stomach. Struggling to take a breath Arthur tried in vain to grab Neville and make him _move_ , because _he couldn't breathe_ , everything hurt and-

Something moved Neville away from him and Arthur was blinded by the sun, though he didn't really care about that right now because he still _couldn't breathe,_ why couldn't he-

"Focus on me Kirkland - look at me."

Madam Hoch was suddenly bent over him, blocking the sun, while she grabbed his arms and held them over his head where he laid on the grass.

"Normally I would make you stand to help the air reach your lungs better, but I don't think that's very wise at the moment. So focus on me Kirkland. Breathe."

Easier said than done, but Arthur tried his best. He focused everything he had on his own breathing and watched as Madam Hoch after a nod made exaggerated deep breaths herself, as if to encourage him to do the same. Oddly enough it worked, and Arthur felt his panic die out as sweet air finally reached his lungs. After what felt like forever, but most likely only were a few minutes, Arthur was then finally able to breathe somewhat normally again.

"Better?" she asked him, and let go off his arms when he nodded in reply.

"Neville?" he asked hoarsely.

"Better off than you. In worst case he has a broken wrist, but that's a quick fix for Madam Pomfrey and is nothing to worry about," she replied and continued to examine him.  
"Any pain? Does your head, neck or back hurt?"

"No, only my left leg," Arthur reluctantly admitted in a hoarse voice and groaned in pain when he felt Madam Hoch gently take hold of his leg to examine it further.  
"Hm, looks like it's broken."

Of course the rest of Arthur's body hurt too, but it was nothing which you couldn't expect from falling off a broom from the height they did, and except for the leg nothing ( _else_ ) felt broken. His left leg really, really hurt though. Meanwhile Madam Hoch hummed in thoughts and with a wave of her wand she then quickly conjured a splint which she secured his leg with before she let Arthur sit up from the ground. It was first now Arthur saw Neville, who sat not far away to Arthur's right side on the ground with his legs spread out and his right arm cradled against his own chest.

"Are you alright?" Arthur hoarsely asked Neville while Madam Hoch stood up and warned the rest of the class they would be thrown out from Hogwarts if they as much as flew an inch while she took Arthur and Neville to the Hospital Wing.

With a ghostly, terrified, white face and tears streaming down his face Neville looked far from okay, but he still nodded in reply. It looked like Neville was about to add something, but they were interrupted when Madam Hoch turned around and helped Neville to stand. Afterwards Madam Hoch directed her wand towards Arthur and made him awkwardly hover – still sitting – in the air beside her before she began to walk them both back towards the castle. It felt odd to sit in the middle of the air with a secured leg while his teacher walked in the middle of himself and Neville, but Arthur supposed he didn't have much choice since he couldn't walk on his left leg right now. With the exception of Neville's occasional sniffling and whimper of pain it was a quiet march up to the castle, and although most students were in class there were still many eyes and whispers which followed them while they climbed the stairs to the Hospital Wing. Arthur mentally groaned once he realized this would be his second time in the Hospital Wing already, and he hadn't even been at Hogwarts for two whole weeks yet.

When they arrived at the Hospital Wing it didn't take long for Madam Pomfrey to come running the moment she saw them. With a slightly annoyed " _tsk, weren't you two the boys who were here last Friday?_ " they were placed in two beds next to each other while Madam Pomfrey went to fetch the medicine she needed. Meanwhile Madam Hoch placed herself standing between the feet of their beds with crossed arms.

"I hope you both realize how lucky you were. You both could just as easily have landed wrong, broken your necks and died - and not even Madam Pomfrey can raise the dead, no matter how great she is at healing."

Neville whimpered at Madam Hoch hard gaze, which was then directed towards Arthur.

"I realize Mr. Longbottom did it on accident, but the only reason I'm not going to take away any points from Slytherin, despite the blatant way you ignored my very clear orders to come back, Mr. Kirkland, is because I still admire your attempt to save your classmate. I advise you to not continue to test your luck though, and the next time you want to save someone you should try to not use yourself as pillow to break their fall."

Arthur felt his face glow red and didn't dare to meet Madam Hoch's harsh gaze as he felt his face heat up in a mixture of embarrassment, anger and shame – although he wasn't sure if he was angry at himself or Madam Hoch's words. Arthur only lifted his face again when he heard and then saw Madam Pomfrey come back with two small bottles of a disgusting-looking liquid.

"I'll leave them in your hands then," Madam Hoch nodded to Pomfrey. "I need to go back to the rest of the class."

"Of course," Madam Pomfrey replied and handed over a bottle each to Arthur and Neville.

Madam Hoch then disappeared through the doors to the Hospital Wing while Arthur and Neville were left to drink up the bottles with the disgusting-looking medicine. Arthur saw Neville cast him a nervous glance.

"Well, what are you two waiting on? Drink it up!"

Since it didn't seem like he had another choice Arthur took a deep breath and then drank it all in one go. Urgh, disgusting!

~o~ ~o~ ~o~ ~o~ ~o~

Back at the lawn and the rest of the class Malfoy burst into laughter the moment their teacher, Arthur and Neville were out of earshot.

"Haha, did you his face when the great lump realized he landed on Kirkland? Personally I don't see why Kirkland even attempted to save him, he should just have let the stupid oaf fall from the begining!"

Malfoy's gang joined the laughter while a few of the other Slytherins looked uncomfortable in the background, but didn't say anything. The only exception seemed to be Katlyn, who was seething in anger, and Hermione felt the anger raise in her chest as well. Arthur and Neville could have _died!_ She had been terrified when she saw them fall to the ground, Neville on top of Arthur, which wasn't exactly helped when they at first had been unable to detect any movement from the two boys. Neville's face when he was moved by Madam Hoch and saw where he landed was horrifying to see, and Hermione could barely stand to look as they all then heard the sounds of Arthur's desperate gasps for air.

"Shut up, Malfoy!" Parvati Patil snapped just before Hermione had the chance to explode at Malfoy.

"Oh, are you sticking up for Longbottom? I never thought _you_ of all people would like fat little crybabies, Parvati," sneered Pansy Parkinson, one of the Slytherin girls in Malfoy's little gang. "Or is it Kirkland? I'll have you know he's _way_ out of your league."

"Oh, and look at this!" Malfoy gleefully shouted out before he darted forward and snatched something from the grass. "It's that stupid ball Longbottom's gran sent him."

The Remembrall Hermione saw how Neville just received this breakfast glittered in the sun when Malfoy held it up for everyone to see.

"Really, the big lump should be more careful with his things – otherwise he might never get to see them again," Malfoy laughed with a mean glint in his eyes.

"Give it here, Malfoy," Harry hissed angrily from Hermione's right side.

Everyone immediately fell silent while they watched what would happen.

"No, I think I will leave it somewhere Longbottom to go and get it instead. Perhaps up in a tree?" Malfoy said with a nasty smile.

" _Give it here_!" Harry yelled angrily, but Malfoy had already jumped up on his broomstick and shot off into the air.

It seemed like all the bragging Hermione and everyone else had been forced to listen to for the last week hadn't been a total lie, because Malfoy actually _could_ fly rather well. Malfoy then flew over to a tree and hovered in the height of the branches at the top of the oak.

"Come and get it if you can and dare, Potter!"

With anger visible on his face Hermione saw how Harry grabbed his broom, actually falling for the mocking.

" _NO!_ " she shouted and tried to talk some sense into Harry. "Didn't you see what just happened to Arthur and Neville!? Besides, Madam Hoch told us not to move – you will get all of us into trouble!"

However she was completely ignored - Harry Potter mounted his broomstick and kicked off the ground, soaring up into the air, without a care about all the trouble they all would end up in if they were caught. Honestly, what did Harry even think he could do? Hermione had heard him and Ron talk about flying in the common room, something Harry had admitted he never had done before, while Malfoy at the other hand obviously had done it many times before. Hermione then saw how Harry pulled up his broom even higher and heard some of her classmates let out a scream or gasp while Ron made an admiring whoop of joy. Harry then sharply turned his broom to face the stunned-looking Malfoy.

"Give me it, or I'll knock you off the broom!" Harry angrily called out to Malfoy for everyone to hear.

"Oh, I would like to see you try," Malfoy said with an attempted sneer, but he looked a little worried now.

For being the first time on a broom in his life even Hermione had to admit Harry was good at flying, who somehow already seemed to know he had to lean forward to fly forward. Harry shot towards Malfoy like a javelin and Malfoy only barely managed to get out of the way in time before Harry made a sharp U-turn and held the broom steady in the air as he faced Malfoy. A few people around Hermione clapped, impressed by Harry's skills.

"There is no Crabbe or Goyle to save your neck up here!" Hermione and the others heard Harry yell to Malfoy.

"Catch it if you can then!" Malfoy, who seemed to have realized this as well, shouted and threw the glass ball high into the air in the direction of the castle.

Harry shot after it, and when the Remembrall began to fall Harry pointed his broom down into a steep dive while Malfoy safely landed on the ground with a smirk.  
The faster and closer to the ground Harry came the more people began to scream.

"He's going to crash!"

"Harry- DON'T!"

Hermione didn't dare to look anymore and hid her face behind her hands, but when the screaming eventually changed into loud cheering she finally dared to look up again - only to see Harry stand safely on the grass with a big grin on his face and the Remembrall clutched in his hand.

"HARRY POTTER!"

Harry's and the rest of the Gryffindors' faces quickly fell as they saw Professor McGonagall run towards them.

" _Never_ \- in all my time at Hogwarts-"

Professor McGonagall was furious and seemed to have a hard time putting her thoughts into words.

"-how _dare_ you – could have broken your neck!"

"It wasn't his fault-"

"Be quiet, Miss Patil-"

"But Malfoy-"

"That's enough, Mr. Weasley. Follow me, Potter. _Now_."

About 25% of Hermione's brain wanted to tell Harry " _I told you so,_ " but when she saw Malfoy and his gang's triumphant faces when Professor McGonagall left with Harry the 75% left promptly wrestled down the 25% and seethed in anger over the injustice of it all. This would never have happened if Harry just _listened_ to her instead of Malfoy, but did he? _Nooooo_ , he didn't, and now everyone in Gryffindor would probably end up in trouble because of the huge amount of points Harry was sure to lose them, if he wasn't already expelled. On top of that it seemed like Malfoy would get away with it, even though he was the one who started everything! The only good thing about this was the fact Madam Hoch came back only seconds later, so at least they didn't need to listen to any of Malfoy's gloating. It was a weak consolation, but at least it was something, and since Madam Hoch didn't even mention the absence of Harry... Hermione could only assume their teacher must have met Professor McGonagall on the way somewhere. Still, it was a downhearted group of Gryffindors with the gloating of the Slytherins in their ears who returned to the castle when the class was over. In her haste to get away from everyone she almost forgot to visit Arthur and Neville in the Hospital Wing, and only remembered just before she reached the stairs to the third floor.

~o~ ~o~ ~o~ ~o~ ~o~

Meanwhile in the Hospital Wing it turned out Arthur's leg wasn't as injured as Madam Hoch originally thought it would be. It was sore, and Madam Pomfrey warned Arthur it would most likely hurt for another day or two, but it wasn't broken or otherwise injured, although Madam Pomfrey for a short moment had frowned in confusion when she examined his leg. Arthur didn't really care about that now though, because this meant his leg didn't require any further treatment and he was free to leave as long as he promised to take it easy with his leg for a few days. Still, he felt like it was his duty to at least wait until Neville was done, which didn't take very long either, and then ( _once again_ ) try to reassure Neville it wasn't his fault they ended up in the Hospital Wing. That part didn't go very well though, because no matter what Arthur said it was clear the sniffling Neville still blamed himself.

"Look," Arthur sighed in annoyance after they left the Hospital Wing and he lost his patience. " _ **I**_ was the one who decided to come after you, so if it's anyone's fault it's my own for placing my broomstick below yours. Besides, it was an accident, and those broomsticks were old enough to have been better off as firewood anyway."

"But-"

"No, it's the end of the discussion! It was no one's fault – _it was an accident_ – and you really need to stop blaming yourself for everything."

"He has a point, you know," the voice of Hermione suddenly commented behind them and both of them jumped in surprise, turning around to face the voice.

"Please don't sneak up like that, Hermione," Neville complained with a little whine.

"Sorry, I'll try not to. I'm glad you two seem to be alright though, and that the both of you already are out of the Hospital Wing. It was a nasty fall."

"Is something wrong?" Arthur carefully asked when he noticed Hermione's tight smile.

"Oh no, everything is perfectly fine. My two friends only scared me half to death when they suddenly fell off their broomsticks 20 feet ( _ca 6,10 meters_ ) up in the air, and then Mr. Selfish Potter decided to ignore everything I said and will most likely have made all of Gryffindor end up in trouble, but no, of course I'm perfectly fine."

Hermione finished her little rant with a huff and then pushed past between them, which left a bewildered Arthur and Neville in the corridor.  
She was soon gone among the sea of students who were on their way to the Great Hall for dinner.

"That was sarcasm, wasn't it?" Neville asked quietly.

"Yes," Arthur replied with a nod, still surprised by her sudden outburst.

"Wait," Neville suddenly gasped as a smile of pure joy suddenly broke out on his face. "Did she just call me her friend?"

"Well, yes," Arthur answered, confused by Neville's sudden happy mood before he felt an odd – but great – and warm feeling of happiness when Arthur realized he had been called her friend as well.

"We better run and catch up her," Arthur commented and tried to keep his face straight.

"Yes," Neville agreed, and they hurried after Hermione.

It didn't take long to catch up either, since it in the end didn't seem like Hermione was in any particular hurry, and Arthur couldn't help but let a small smile slip onto his face as he and Neville joined up on each side of Hermione.

"What got you two into such good mood all of sudden?" Hermione asked and looked back and forth between Arthur and Neville with a confused frown.

"Nothing," Arthur denied with a shake of his head, but kept the small smile on his face. "I'll see you in the library later."

They had arrived to the Great Hall, and Arthur had almost already reached the Slytherin table before Hermione even had the chance to answer. Arthur sat down on the seat next to Jade.

"There you are - Katlyn just told us what happened. We planned to visit you after the dinner, but I suppose that's not needed now," Jack grinned from the seat on the opposite side of Jade.

"How are you feeling?" Jade asked him and handed him the potatoes.

"I'm fine, it looked worse than it was."

Katlyn, who sat next to Jack and on the opposite side of Arthur, looked skeptical.

"It's the truth," Arthur assured her when he noticed her expression. "The leg is just sore, not broken or anything. Madam Pomfrey let me leave the Hospital Wing with a warning my leg will most likely hurt a little for the next day or two, which it does, but otherwise I'm completely fine."

"If you say so," Katlyn replied.

She still appeared to be a little skeptical, but she let it be.

"You know, when I told you how I hurt my own leg I didn't mean for you to go and try to do the same," Jack laughed.

"Wha- I didn't-" Arthur began to protest.

"Don't worry, I'm just teasing you," Jack winked with a laugh.

"However I suppose this means you're grounded for a while now."

Katlyn snorted in amusement and Jade groaned as she facepalmed.

"Really, Jack? Really?"

Jack ignored Jade's comment and only continued to laugh.

o.o.o.( **End of Chapter 08** ).o.o.o

 **Author Note: Once again I would like to thank everyone who read, fave, follow and/or review - you're awesome!**

 **I will also remind you all this is the _last_ _chapter_ I already had uploaded on Deviantart,  
and even though I'm currently writing chapter 09 it will take a little longer than it has until now to update the story.  
Just so you know. I'll of course do my best though, so hopefully it will not take _too_ long before chapter 09 is done. :D **

**So with that said, please enjoy, and I hope to see you next chapter! /Jezzica**

 **o.o.o**

 **(PS.)** **Don't worry** MedusaLegend **, I'm evil and don't want to spoil too much of what will happen later,  
but rest assured I have many plans which include the other nations as well. ;) **


	9. Ch09 - Three heads too many!

"Can you belive them!?" Hermione hissed angrily to Arthur.

Just as they promised before dinner Arthur and Hermione like usual met up in the library after they had eaten, but the good mood from before dinner seemed to compleatly have disappeared. Although Hermione for once wasn't even able to focus on her homework she instead only talked about her two classmates.

"The nerve! Can't they see Malfoy only wants to trick them to end up in trouble!? They're so selfish! It's a miracle Harry didn't get expelled after his earlier stunt today, and now those two want to meet Malfoy in the middle of the night for a wizard duel. Idiots! Do they _want_ to get expelled!?"

Arthur flinched as Hermione ripped off another piece of parchment with such force he almost got the feeling Hermione imagined it was someone's head, but at the same time Arthur had to admit Hermione had a point. Not only Gryffindor would lose points either - if Malfoy was caught Slytherin would lose points as well.

"Do you want to tell a teacher?" Arthur questioned her, not sure what else to say.

"No," she sighed, resigned, in reply. "We don't have any evidence, and I don't want to been known as a tattler. Besides, if the teacher actually believes us Gryffindor will just lose points anyway."

"True," Arthur acknowledged in a mutter. The same would of course be true with Slytherin as well.  
"To be honest I don't think we can do much about it then. Maybe we should just let them get caught by themselves so they're taught a lesson. Either that or you tell your Prefect – isn't he Ron's brother or something?"

"It's tempting, but I'm not going to give up yet," Hermione stated with a glint of determination in her eyes.

With those words she immediately stood up, gathered all of her things and began to walk towards the exit of the library, which was why Arthur suddenly was suddenly forced to hurry after her to not be left behind.

"How do you plan to stop them?" Arthur asked Hermione when he finally caught up with her again just outside the library.

" _We_ are going to take a serious talk with those three. I'll find a way to convince Harry and Ron – they're probably in the common room now - while your job will be to talk some sense into Malfoy."

"Wait- _w_ _hat!?_ " Arthur exclaimed in disbelief and came to a halt in the middle of a step.

Hermione turned around to face him with a serious expression. "Well, yes, you don't Slytherin to lose any points either, do you?"

"Of course I don't want that, but do you honestly expect Malfoy to listen to _me_ of all people?" Arthur asked her with a frustrated sigh.

At best they – Arthur and Malfoy - had a truce with each other, but that was only because Malfoy seemed to be wary of Arthur. Well, perhaps it would be more accurate to say Malfoy was wary of his family, but it still didn't change the fact Arthur seriously doubted Malfoy would listen to anything he said. To Arthur it was obvious Malfoy didn't like him, and Arthur could honestly say the feelings were returned. Hermione probably didn't know about all of this though, which was why she so easily could point out something which, to her, was obvious.

"We don't know until we try, do we?"

Which Arthur acknowledged was a good point, but that didn't mean he had to like it even if Hermione spent the next 15 minutes trying to convince him. Which she eventually also did.

"Fine, I'll try! Just don't expect me to succeed."

They reached more stairs and stopped just as he said this, and Hermione beamed happily.

"Thank you Arthur, I knew I could trust you!"

"Uh, yeah… You're welcome," Arthur muttered back without meeting her eyes and felt his own face redden.

The warm feeling of happiness which began to spread through his body were not because of her words though!  
R-really, he was just happy she was going to stop talking about it. It wasn't like he agreed to talk to Malfoy just because Hermione asked him to!

Since he didn't have anything else to do once they parted ways Arthur began to walk down the many stairs to Slytherin's common room - well, at least once Hermione disappeared in the direction of Gryffindor's own coomon room - at the same time as he tried to not to think about what he soon would have to do.

When he arrived to the hidden door which led to Slytherins common room he muttered the password and walked inside as soon as the door opened, but to Arthur's surprise he didn't see many students inside. To be fair it was still early evening though, and Arthur supposed many of his fellow Slytherins still walked around in the castle or did their homework in the library. With no idea what else to do, since Malfoy and his gang weren't here either, Arthur walked down the stairs to their dorm and went to spend some quality time with Cassie. Being a cat clearly had it's benefits, because when Arthur entered the dorm one of the first thing he saw was Cassie sleeping peacefully on top of his bed. Arthur sighed with fond annoyance, sat down on the edge of the bed and gently lifted the cat to lay her in his lap. Cassie woke up when Arthur lifted her, but she didn't seem to mind and soon fell back asleep while Arthur petted her. Eventually he then decided to close the curtains around his bed and read in peace for a while, so he picked up his books about fairies, laid down on his bed and began to read, with Cassie continuing to sleep peacefully on top of his stomach.

At one point Arthur must have dozed off, because the next moment he was rudely awoken when loud, laughing voices entered the dorm – and one of them was Malfoy.  
It was very tempting to just roll over and go back to sleep, but Arthur had promised Hermione to talk to Malfoy about the wizarding duel, so he would.  
However just as Arthur sat up in his bed to open the curtains around his bed to talk with Malfoy the sickly sweet voice of Pansy Parkinson beat him to it.

"Are you really going to go through with the duel, Draco? Potter isn't worth your time, and what if you get caught?"

In his surprise Arthur halted any further movement when he heard Malfoy laugh in reply.

"Hah, of course not! While Potter and Weasley run around I will sleep peacefully in my bed. Who knows, _someone_ might have tipped off Mr. Filch there is going to be a Wizard's Duel in the trophy room tonight, and it would be a shame if I was caught together with Potter and Weasley."

Arthur could practically hear the glee in Malfoy's voice, and so it was with mixed feelings Arthur laid down on his bed again while he was forced to listen to the little gang's eruption of laughter. ' _Malfoy must think I'm asleep since the curtains are closed around my bed, or else he wouldn't talk about this so freely,'_ Arthur then thought for himself.

At one hand Arthur was happy he wouldn't need to talk to Malfoy after all – it was clear Malfoy had no intention of showing up at the Wizard Duel anyway. However it was also clear Harry and Ron were going to walk straight into a trap if nothing was done. They might even get expelled for it… A part of Arthur wanted to think it served them right for breaking the rules despite Hermione's earlier warnings – because he doubted they would listen to Hermione and go anyway - but the other part of him knew it wasn't fair those two would end up in trouble when Malfoy had goaded them into it. Yes, Potter and Weasley were idiots since they fell for the goading in the first place, but it wasn't fair Malfoy would get away with getting other students in trouble like this either. Since Malfoy wasn't going Arthur supposed he could just sneak away and warn Potter before Filch had the chance to catch them, but that would also put himself at risk at getting caught…

' _Coward_ ', Arthur's mind told himself, _'Don't make excuses, even Patrick admits you're good at sneaking – you will not get caught as long as you're careful.'_

Yet he didn't move even a long time after the last torches slowly had died out and snoring could be heard in the dorm.

 _'They're walking into a trap, but that doesn't necessarily mean they will get caught_ ,' Arthur tried to tell himself and rolled over to sleep.

There was no point to risk getting himself into trouble for those two. They could take care of themselves, and really, if they weren't able to avoid getting caught they only had themselves to blame.

Yet the sleep still didn't come, and instead Arthur laid wide awake while he watched his wristwatch slowly creep past 11 PM to half past eleven. With a groan Arthur swore under his breath and sat up in his bed. At this rate he wasn't going to be able to fall asleep anyway, so after he gently lifted off Cassie from his lap and laid her on his bed ( _which she woke up at and glared at him - as if asking him what he did that for - before she went back to sleep_ ) Arthur quietly opened the curtains around his bed just a little to look around. Everyone, with the exception of himself, seemed to be fast asleep. No one would notice if he seaked away for awhile – at most he would be gone for 30 minutes. He just needed to sneak to the trophy room, warn Harry and Ron, then sneak back again without getting discovered. No problem, right?

A part of his brain loudly yelled at Arthur about how stupid idea this was and how many things which could go wrong, but it was quickly wrestled down by the part of him which already made the decision to go. Besides, if Harry and Ron were caught because of this Malfoy's gloating would become unbearable to stand, so with that in mind Arthur made sure he had his wand ( _just in case_ ) before he silently crept past his classmates' beds and up the stairs to the common room. The common room was almost compleatly dark and silent with the exception for the few embers still in the fireplace, which weakly lit up the common room in a creepy green colour. Ignoring this Arthur quietly walked over to the door and exited the room and then took a deep breath as he looked out over the dark dungeon-corridor. There was no turning back now.

Because of how dark it was Arthur was forced to risk a little light from his wand with a whispered " _Lumos_ " until he had left the dungeons, but the moment he was out from them he turned it off and let the moonlight shining through the windows show him the way instead. The school was very different in the middle of the night, and as Arthur crept up the stairs to the upper floors he couldn't help but to feel a bit jumpy over the slightest sound. By some miracle he made it to the same corridor as the trophy room without being caught, and he made a sigh of relief when he could heard hissed whispers inside. He must have arrived in time then, because he doubted Mr. Filch would be quiet about catching students out of bed.

He quietly opened the door and slipped inside, only to face-

"You!? What are you doing here and where is Malfoy?" Harry hissed angrily on the opposite side of the room before Arthur even had the time to open his mouth.

"Arthur? What are you doing here?"

To Arthur's surprise he saw Hermione and Neville stand behind Harry, and together with Ron they all wore expressions with various degrees of confusion visible on their faces in the dim light.

"I could ask you the same," Arthur replied to Hermione in equal confusion before he remembered what he came to do. "Nevermind that though, we need to get out of here."

"Why?" Harry asked warily.

"I came to warn you. Malfoy tricked you – he never intended to duel against you and has ratted you out to Filch, who might be here any second now. It's a trap."

"I told you- " Hermione angrily directed towards Harry while Neville let out a whimper, but they were both interrupted by Ron.

"Why should we believe you? You're snake just like Malfoy."

"Are you serious? Why would I even risk getting caught to warn you if it wasn't the truth?" Arthur angrily hissed back.

"Why would you even come here and risk getting caught in the first place? We haven't talked to each other since the train to Hogwarts," Harry added with narrowed eyes.

Beginning to lose his patience Arthur growled in frustration.  
"I'm beginning to wonder the same, because clearly it was too much to expect you to just appreciate the warning and get out of here!"

Ron seemed to be on his way to say something else, but a sudden noise in the next room made them all jump in fright. Arthur saw how Harry raised his wand – maybe expecting Malfoy to jump out despite Arthur's warning – when they to their horror heard Filch speak to who Arthur understood was Mrs Norris.

"Sniff around, my sweet, they might lurk somewhere in a corner."

Struck in horror Arthur wasted no time in folloing after Harry and the others when they as quick as possible scurried away towards the door on the opposite side of where Filch's voice came from. Arthur's and Neville's robes barely had the time to whip around the corner when they all heard Filch enter the trophy room from the same door Arthur entered the room.

"They're probably hiding somewhere inside here," Arthur and the rest heard him mutter.

Harry mouthed for them to follow him, and once again they wasted no time in creeping down a corridor full of suits of armour. There was no doubt they were in trouble now, and as they heard Filch coming closer Neville let out a frightened squek and began to run. Neville, who had to be one of the unluckiest boys in the world, of course tripped, grabbed Ron around the waist in an desperate attempt to not fall and as if in slowmotion Arthur saw how they together fell right on a suit of armour. The resulting clanging and crashing was loud enough to wake the whole castle.

"RUN!" Harry yelled, and with a jerk Arthur tugged Neville and Ron up to their feet and sprinted after Harry without looking back to see if Filch followed them or not. They rounded a doorpost and ran down corridor after corridor without even really knowing where they were before they reached a tapestry and hurtled past it into a hidden passageway. It was as they dashed into the new corridor Arthur finally recognized they were close to the Charms classroom, which he also knew was far away from the trophy room. Harry, who was the one who led them here, seemed to realize the same and finally slowed down before he eventually came to a stop.

"I- I think we lost him," Harry panted heavily and leaned back against the stone wall.

Arthur followed Harry's example and grimaced as a stinging pain began to travel up his left leg. Running around at full speed was hardly to "take it easy", as Madam Pomfry told him to do after he fell off the broom earlier that day, and he was paying for it now. Meanwhile Neville was not much better off - he was bent double, wheezing and gasping for breath.

" _I-I told you_. Art-Arthur too!" Hermione gasped and clutched her chest while she tried to catch her breath in her seething anger towards Harry.

"We need to get back to the common room as fast as possible," Ron swallowed.

"Malfoy tricked you, just like Arthur told you he would," Hermione snarled towards Harry. "You realise that, don't you? Malfoy tipped Filch off to get you into trouble!"

It didn't seem like Harry had anything to say about that, and instead Arthur only heard a muttered "Let's go". Ignoring the gradually growing pain in his leg Arthur pushed off from the wall and followed Harry and the rest down the corridor again. They didn't come very far though. Not even a dozen steps later a doorknoob rattled and something shot out from a classroom in front of them. It was none other than Peeves the Poltergeist.

Unfortunately for them Peeves loved to cause trouble for everyone who was unfortunate enough to meet him, with the only exception being The Bloody Baron, Slytherin's ghost, who Peeves was afraid off and the only one who also was able to control Peeves. However the Bloody Baron wasn't here right now, and Arthur and the rest had already been seen. With a squel of delight Peeves' grin grew wider as he saw their little group.

"Please shut up, Peeves, you'll get us thrown out," Harry begged him.

Peeves cackled merrily. "First years wandering around after midnight? Tut, tut, tut. Naughty, naughty, you'll get caughty."

"Not if you don't give us away, Peeves. Please?"

"Should tell Filch, I should. It's for your own good, you know," Peeves said in an almost innocent-sounding voice while his eyes glittered cruelly.

"Get out of the way!" Ron snapped and destroyed any chance they had at walking away undetected when he took a swipe at Peeves.

"STUDENTS OUT OF THE BED! STUDENTS OUT THE BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRIDOR!"

Arthur and the rest immediately ducked under the bellowing Peeves and ran for their lives to the end of the corridor, where they slammed into a door-  
A locked door they weren't able to open.

"This is it! We are done for! This is the end!" Ron moaned as he and Harry helplessly pushed at the door.

They could hear the footsteps of Filch only coming closer and closer as he ran towards Peeves' shouts.

"Are you a wizard or not!? Use magic and unlock the door!" Arthur growled threateningly from the back.

"Wha-"

"Oh, move over!" Hermione snarled and pushed Ron out of the way to reach the door at the same time as she brought out her wand.

" _Alohomora_."

The door opened with a click and they immediately ran through, quickly shut it and pressed their ears against it as they listened to the conversation on the other side of the door.

"Quick, which way did they go Peeves?" Arthur heard Filch say.

"Say ' _please_ ' first."

"Don't mess with me, Peeves. Now _where did they go_?"

"Shan't say nothing if you don't say please," Arthur heard Peeves sing-song mockily in answer.

"Urgh, alright, _please_."

"NOTHING! Haha, I told you I wouldn't say nothing if you didn't say please! Haha!"

Then, to Arthur's relief he heard how Peeves whoshed away while Filch cursed loudly in rage.

"He must think this door is still locked," Harry whispered when they all heard Filch's steps walk away in another direction.  
"I think we will be okay now – get off Neville!"

Arthur looked to his right to see a ghostly white-faced Neville tug on Harry's robes while he with a terrified expression looked up at something behind them.  
With a bad feeling in their stomach Arthur, Harry, Hermione and Ron then turned to look at the thing which scared Neville so much, but immediately wished they hadn't.

Unlike what Arthur originally thought they weren't in a room, but instead in yet another corridor. The forbidden corridor on the third floor to be more exact, which Arthur and the others now quickly realised why it was forbidden. Because right in front of them stood a monstrous, gigantic dog with three heads, which stood absolutely still and stared at them with six pairs of rolling, mad eyes. Arthur got the feeling the only reason they weren't already dead was because the monstrous dog was surprised by their sudden appearance, but considering the thunderous growls from the dog the surprise was quickly beginning to wear off.

Arthur saw from the corner of his eyes how Harry, who was the closest to the doorknoob, fumbled blindly after it a moment before he got a hold of it and the door swung open. Everyone jumped outside and Harry slammed the door shut before all of them almost flew through the castle faster than Arthur had ever run before in his entire life. Not that anyone cared at this point – they just wanted to get as far away as possible from _that monster – and why is there a monster in a school!?_ \- but it seemed like Filch must have hurried away to look after them somewhere else, because they didn't meet him nor Mrs Norris again.

They didn't come to an stop until they reached an old portait of a very fat lady in a pink silk dress on the seventh floor, who seemed to be surprised to see them.

"Where on earth have you all been?"

"Never mind that – pig snout, pig snout!" Harry panted.

"Are you sure?" she asked with a frown and glanced to Arthur.

"Yes!"

By now Arthur _should_ have understood something was up, but his leg hurt too much for him to think about it at the moment, and so Arthur and the others immediately scrambled inside when the portrait swung forward and revealed a round hole in the wall. The moment they were inside Arthur sank down on the floor while the others collapsed in the armchairs around the room. Arthur panted heavily while he tried to massage the pain away from his legs, not really noticing or caring what else the others did at the moment, although he suspected they just like him tried their best to catch their breath. Eventually the pain also subsided to an bearable level, and Arthur let out a sigh of relief.

"What do they think they're doing, keeping a thing like that locked up in school?" Ron finally growled out after everyone's breathing had become more normal.

With both her breath and temper back Hermione snapped. "You don't use your eyes, do you? Didn't you see what it was standing on?"

"The floor?" Harry suggested, and Arthur resited the urge to facepalm. "I wasn't looking at the feet since I was too busy with it's three heads."

Alright, Arthur supposed that was fair – it's not every day you come face to face with a huge three-headed dog _i_ _n a school_.

"No, not the floor. It was standing on a trapdoor, so it's obviously guarding something!" Hermione snapped back and angrily stood up from her armchair to glare at Harry and Ron.  
"I hope you two are pleased with yourself. We all could have been killed – or worse, expelled – just because you two refused to liten to me or Arthur."

Arthur mostly agreed – they would never have ended up in this mess if Harry and Ron just listened from the beginning – but unlike Hermione he definitely counted killed as worse than expelled.

"Wait, why are _YOU_ here!?"

Arthur looked up from his leg to glare at the now angry and standing Ron, who glared straight back.

"What are you talking about? I've been with you four since I tried to warn you about Filch – you're welcome by the way."

"No, Ron is right – why are you here? You're not allowed in here!"

It was Harry who said it this time, and Arthur was just about to demand Harry explained what he meant when Arthur finally, truly looked around and saw where he was. The room they sat in was a cosy, round room full of comfy armchairs and a warm fireplace with only a few embers still burning. However what caught most of Arthur's attention wasn't how cosy the room looked, but the fact all the coulours in the room were in red and gold, and why would it be that unless- Oh… _Shit._

Comprehendment dawned upon Arthur as he stared with wide eyes and slightly gaping mouth in shock at the banner over the fireplace with a great lion drawn in the middle.  
He was in Gryffindors common room. _He was in Gryffindor's common room!_

"Well, what are you waiting on? Get out!"

Snapped out of his shock by Ron's words Arthur turned back to glare at him.

"Like hell I am! We're on the seventh floor, and everone knows we have our common room is in the dungeons. I'm not going to risk getting caught by Filch _again_ just after I have saved you two from what most likely would get you two expelled!"

"Oh, what are we going to do?" Hermione moaned. "We will end up in so much trouble for this!"

Alright, Hermione had a point there. While there is no _official_ rule about not being allowed to sleep in other houses' common rooms there was still a very clear _u_ _n_ official one which was very against it – especially between Gryffindor and Slytherin. Compared to what the other Gryffindors' reactions to finding a Slytherin in their common room would be Arthur suspected Ron's reaction was a mild one.

"We can't let someone from Slytherin stay here, so get out!" Ron hissed.

"Do you think I _want_ to stay here!? If I could go back to my own bed right now I would have done that already!"

"I don't care, get out!" Ron angrily hissed, stomped over and forcedly tugged Arthur up on his feet from the floor.

Arthur didn't even have the time to protest before seering pain shot through his leg like fire and, unable to support his own weight, he crumpled down on the floor again with a yelp of pain the moment Ron let go of his arm. ' _This is pathetic, get up_ ,' Arthur thought angrily to himself and closed his eyes tightly in pain, but didn't move. The pain was just too much right now.

"Arthur, are you alright?"

Arthur opened his eyes to see Hermione sitting on her knees next to him with worry clear in her eyes, while a equally worried Neville fidgeted over him, looking like he had no idea what to do. Somewhere in the back of his mind Arthur realised they must have pushed Ron to the side in order to reach him, because Ron had backed away from Arthur with a slightly horrified expression on his face.

"I'm fine," Arthur bit out through the pain to answer Hermione's question, even if it was clear he wasn't.

"You should just have said you were injured from the beginning," Ron muttered, but the expression on his face made it clear he felt guilty.

"Well, sorry if I thought it was obvious I was still a bit sore. It's not like I fell off a broom in the middle of the air or anything earlier today," Arthur couldn't help but to snap back over Hermione's head.

Ron's eyes flashed with anger, but before he could answer Harry elbowed him ligthly in his stomach to stop him.

"I suppose we don't have a choice then. You'll have to stay the night," Harry said carefully.

Hermione bit her lips nervously at this, as if she was torn between following the rules and worrying about Arthur, but eventually she made up her mind.

"Arthur, do you think you can move to the armchairs? That way the rest of this should be easier to fix as well."

"Sure," Arthur grunted back and made a ( _failed_ ) attempt to stand.

It was embarrassing, but without a word about it Hermione - and surprisingly Ron too – grabbed Arthur's arms and helped him to stand so Arthur shakily could jump over to the armchairs on one leg by himself. His left leg still hurt, but at least it wasn't too bad as long as Arthur didn't actually use it to keep his body standing. Besides, he knew it would be alright again with a night's rest. Before Arthur sat down Harry had also moved one of the armchairs so it stood next to a wall, so even if though there was no sofa in the common room Arthur could still use the tiny space between the armchair and the wall like a natural place to rest his head. Considering the circumstances it wasn't too bad and as Arthur sat down in the armchair he gave a short, but grateful, nod to Harry.

"You still need to be gone before the others wake up, so go early in the morning before anyone comes down to the common room," Harry stated.

"Of course."

Wasn't that obvious? Besides, Arthur needed to at least make it back to the common room before Malfoy and the others woke up and realised he wasn't in bed.

"Good," was Harry's only reply before he went up the stairs, Ron closely following, to where Arthur assumed the dorms were.

"Well, I… I should probably go to bed as well," Neville nervously told them. "Will you be alright here Arthur? The common room can be very scary when it's dark."

"Don't worry, I'll be fine," Arthur reassured Neville with a small smile. It was hard to even pretend to be grumpy at the nervous boy.

"A-alright! I'll see you both tomorrow!"

With that Neville waved him and Hermione goodnight before he scrambled after Harry and Ron up to the boys' dorms. Then… Silence. Hermione still looked towards where Neville went up the stairs with a frown on her face and she seemed to be... Well, Arthur wasn't sure what Hermione was. She wasn't necessarily tense, but neither was she relaxed.

"Are you angry?" Arthur eventually decided to ask her.

"Not at you," Hermione sighed softly and turned around to face him. "Although I still believe this was an incredible stupid idea. Really, why did you come to warn them? You could have got caught, and Madam Pomfrey told you to take it easy with your leg, didn't she?"

"Well, yes, but…" and then Arthur explained to Hermione everything he overheard from Malfoy, and she nodded in understanding.

"I still don't agree with your decision, but it's nothing we can do about it now – and I suppose it's only fair to tell you how I and Neville ended up going with Harry and Ron as well," Hermione said and then told him everything about her confrontation with Harry and Ron in the common room, to how the Fat Lady had left her portrait for a walk and left Hermione locked out and then how they happened upon Neville.

"I wonder what that dog is guarding," Arthur mused aloud for himself after a short time of silence when she was finished.

Hermione frowned.

"No idea, but it has to be something valuable. They say Hogwarts is the safest place in Britain to hide something, and I don't see why else they would have a three-headed dog in a school in the first place."

There was another short silence while they thought about it.

"It's late, so I should go to bed," Hermione then eventualy sighed as she looked out through a window and then back at Arthur. "Will you be alright?"

"Yes, I'll be fine. I've slept in worse places," Arthur commented with a shrug.

Hermione raised a questioning eyebrow at him, but didn't ask about it.

"Well, goodnight then."

"Goodnight."

While Hermione climbed the stairs up to the girls' dormitory Arthur made himself comfortable in the armchair and prepared himself to sleep, and it didn't take long before his eyes began to feel heavy. Soon enough he fell into a light sleep, unaware of the two pairs of grinning eyes who moved away from the shadows at the staircase and sneaked back for the stairs.

"Well, George, I think we both know what we should do tomorrow," Fred whispered with a grin to his twin.

o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o  
o.o.o.( **End of Chapter 09** ).o.o.o

 **Thank you so such much for all the support - the reviews, faves and everything! It means a lot to me, and if I could make heart-icons on ff I would use them to show you all just how much I appreciate you guys! - Now, time to answer some of the reviews!  
**

Guest: **No idea, but I'm happy you seem to like my fanfiction!**

Sweet little cookie: **Thank you, I hope you enjoyed this chapter as well! And yes, Neville does, doesn't he? Neville is probably a bit clumsier than North Italy though. ;)**

Cookizilla: **'Merlin' was England's alias/"human name" during the war against Voldy. I've always imagined nations change their names from time to time to not make it _too_ obvious they don't age or change. :) I'm also happy you caught the Naruto-reference! x)  
As for if the other nations know about what has happened... Yes, they do.  
I don't want to spoil things which will happen in the future, but if you remember what I wrote in Ch01 and Ch05 you'll see hints to it. :) ;)  
I'm not spoiling the rest which will happen~! Thank you for the many reviews though, they make me happy! :D**

Thenameyouforgot **: Thank you!**

o.o.o.o.o


	10. Ch10 - Run Cauldron, RUN!

o.o.o.o.o

Considering the fact Arthur slept in an armchair beside a dead fire for the rest of the night, he slept surprisingly well.  
Thus it was a well rested Arthur who eventually sleepily woke up and stretched his arms over his head with a yawn.

"Well, well, well – look who finally decided to wake up."

Arthur's eyes snapped opened and stared in shock at the two red-haired, slightly older boys who stood in front of him.  
They were obviously twins, and Arthur's newly awaken brain somehow managed to remember they were Ron's older brothers Fred and George Weasley.  
The pranksters Jack told him about during the welcoming feast.

"It looks like a snake got trapped inside the lions' den, brother dear," Fred, or George - Arthur didn't know who – answered his brother.

Both of them were grinning down at Arthur, who still sat in the armchair and could only open and close his mouth in shock without any sound coming out.  
Shit… What was he supposed to do about this? Arthur nervously threw a quick a glance towards the exit, but the twin brothers seemed to know what he was thinking about.

"Ah, I wouldn't try to run if I were you. Unlike you we have two pairs of _healthy_ and _uninjured_ legs, while you only have one," the first brother told him.

"Wha- How did you know-?"

"Our brother and the rest of you weren't exactly quiet when you came back," the second brother commented with a grin and a shrug.

"Just be happy we decided to do our youngest brother a favour and cast a few silencing charms around you five so you didn't wake up the whole tower."

Arthur swallowed nervously. He was beginning to hear barely audible shuffling somewhere on the floors above, and with some panic rising in his chest Arthur realised the rest of the Gryffindors were beginning to wake up. If he didn't get out soon Arthur would need to deal with with all of the Gryffindors, and he doubted they would be happy to see him in their tower. Admittedly Arthur wouldn't have been very happy to see a Gryffindor in the Slytherin common room either, but it wasn't like he _wanted_ to sit here and wait to find out what the reactions of the other Gryffindors would be. Unfortunately the only way Arthur would be able to leave the tower now was if the Weasley twins let him, and that didn't seem very likely at the moment. So imagine Arthur's great surprise when Fred and George looked up to the roof with frowns of annoyance, as if the rest of the Gryffindors waking up was a bother rather than a good thing.

"Well, it looks like we're almost out of time, so for now we should get you out of here!"

Without any warning the twins heaved him up on his feet, ( _Arthur's left leg protested a little against the sudden movement, but to his relief it at least didn't hurt any longer,_ ) before they immediately hooked their arms in his, dragged Arthur off towards the exit and completely ignored his sounds of confusion. Once outside the common room they then speeded through a few empty corridors and stairs before they shoved Arthur into an empty classroom and closed the door after themselves once they also were inside. Arthur narrowed his eyes, feeling trapped with the twins between him and the closed door, but took a deep breath and prepared himself to fight in case he would need to.

"Now when we're away from prying eyes I think it's about time we introduce each other," the twin to the left said and gave Arthur a dramatic bow before he stood up again.

"My name is Fred Weasley, and this is my twin George."

"I'm Arthur Kirkland," Arthur answered cautiously with a frown, unsure of what they wanted to do with him.

"We know, and this just happens to be your lucky day," Fred – no, George – continued from where his brother left off, although Arthur had a hard time to see how all of this could be considered lucky.

"You see, normally we're not very fond of snakes, but you've caught our interests!"

Arthur wasn't sure if he considered that a good or a bad thing.

"After we saw-"

"-and heard-"

"-our dear younger brother sneak off with his new friends we decided to stay up for a while to see what he was going to do, and for once he didn't disapoint us!"

Fred pretended to wipe away a tear. "We're so proud – there is still hope for him!"

"To think he and his friends would dare to let a Slytherin inside our tower. I wish we had thought of that," George added with a laugh.

"Wait, the whole thing was an accident, and Ron was not-"

Arthur wasn't even sure why he tried to defend Ron – the other boy didn't even like him.

"We know, we heard the whole story when you and Granger talked after our brother and the others had gone to bed," Fred inturrupted Arthur with a grin.

"Oh," Arthur blinked in surprise. He hadn't expected that, although maybe he should have. "What will happen now then?"

"Well, nothing really," Fred replied with a light shrug. "We just wanted to ask you a question, and then you're free to go."

"What kind of question?" Arthur asked them warily.

"Well, we want to know-"

"-a few details about the forbidden floor and the three-headed dog."

Fred threw a quick glance towards his brother before his eyes returned to Arthur and continued to explain.

"You see, we have tried to open the locked door to see what's hidden behind it ever since Dumbledore's speech, but we have been unable to do it."

George nodded in agreement. "None of the normal spells worked, so how did you guys enter it?"

"Eh, Hermione just used the unlocking spell, and it worked," Arthur answered in confusion, not understanding why they would even _want_ to enter the door.

"Are you sure?" George asked with a frown.

"Yes, Ron and Harry didn't know the spell, so Hermione shoved them aside and unlocked the door by saying _Alohomora_ ," Arthur answered with a glare, as if to dare them to accuse him of lying.

George shrugged. "Just making sure. So was it really a three-headed dog?"

Arthur hesitated just a moment. Should he really tell them? In the end he decided it was best to tell them the truth.

"Yes, and to be honest I'm surprised we didn't die, but it was a close call."

"Amazing, a three-headed dog here in school…" George grinned, as if he hadn't heard a word of what Arthur said after "yes".

"Well, that was everything, so you're free to go now," Fred grinned with his brother and made another dramatic bow towards Arthur.

"Right now Peeves is on the first floor around the classroom for History of Magic, so you might want to take another way down. It's almost seven o'clock too, so you should go directly to the Great Hall for breakfast instead of going back to your own dorm. We'll see you around!"

Without another word both of them turned around, opened the door behind them and left the classroom. Arthur blinked in utter confusion.  
What the hell just happened? Was that really it? It felt too easy. Were they waiting for him to let down his guard or were they just saving it for blackmail?  
Somehow he doubted it, because they hadn't even hinted at what they would do with the information. Arthur shook his head to clear his mind.  
They were probably only letting him go for their brother's sake. If the rest of the Gryffindors found out Ron, Harry, Hermione and Neville let him – a Slytherin – sleep in the Gryffindor's common room Arthur knew he wouldn't be the only one in trouble.

Deciding to not think too much about it for now Arthur walked over to the door and exited the classroom. They had a point though – he really should hurry down to the Great Hall. If he arrived to breakfast before his friends and fellow Slytherins he could just say he wasn't able to sleep if anyone asked where he had been. With his decision made Arthur quickly walked down the closest stairs and made sure to avoid the classroom for History of Magic, although he couldn't help to wonder how they even knew Peeves was there in the first place…

o.o.o.o.o

Fred frowned slightly as he walked beside his twin. It was still a little too early for breakfast for both their tastes, so right now they just walked around the castle aimlessly in silence. Well, that was until Fred decided they were far enough from the classroom for it to be safe to talk.

"Do you reckon he told us the truth?" Fred eventually asked his brother.

"Yes, he even sounded surprised at our question, and when I asked him if he was sure he looked annoyed. We could ask Ron to confirm it, but I believe the Kirkland-boy spoke the truth," George answered thoughtfully.

"That gives us another question though, doesn't it?" Fred sighed in annoyance. "Why didn't the normal unlocking spell work when _we_ tried it?"

George shrugged. "No idea."

They walked down another staircase.

"Why did you change the plan though?" Fred now asked instead after a short silence. "I thought the original plan was to ask him about the glow around his leg."

George shrugged.

"I doubt he was even aware of it himself. Didn't you notice? That faint golden glow only began to surround his leg _after_ he fell asleep, and then it stopped just before he woke up again. When we dragged him out of the tower Kirkland didn't show any sign of pain either, so I can only conclude his left leg no longer hurts."

"Wait, do you mean you believe his magic _unconsciously_ healed his leg? That would be seriously advanced healing-magic, George. The Kirkland-kid shouldn't be able to pull something like that while not even being aware of it."

They stopped to walk and faced each other.

"Well, that's the interesting part, isn't it?" George grinned. "That kind of spells needs an incredible amount of magic too. Kirkland hasn't even been at Hogwarts for a month yet, so considering how powerful he already has to be to pull of that kind of spell _unconsciously_... Just imagine how strong he will be in a few years when he can use that kind of magic _whenever he wants_ to."

Fred's face broke out in a grin as well. "I can't wait. I think we will need to keep a close eye on Kirkland."

"Indeed."

o.o.o.o.o

Once Arthur was down in the Great Hall he quickly realised he was one of the very first to arrive for breakfast, and even though it didn't take long until everyone else also began to arrive Arthur was still almost done with his breakfast when Jack, Jade and Katlyn finally arrived.

"We know you like to get up early, but this is almost ridiculous," Jack snorted in amusment and sat down next to Arthur while Jade and Katlyn took the seats on the opposite side of the table.

"Couldn't sleep," Arthur shrugged and hoped they wouldn't press for details. He felt bad for lying to them, but this time it was necessary.

Arthur sat with them until they finished their breakfast, and then walked back to the common room together with them to gather the books they would need for their first class. Since it was Friday he and Katlyn were going to have Potions with the Gryffindors again, but despite the fact Professor Snape was the head of their house Arthur couldn't bring himself to look forward to the class. Hopefully this lesson would at least not go worse than their previous one, which had sent him and Neville to the Hospital Wing. Arthur really didn't want to spend his third time in the Hospital Wing already, thank you very much.

According to Katlyn and Hermione his cauldron had, on top of everything else, also literally grown legs and hidden under Professor Snape's desk after the incident. Since Professor Snape refused to do anything about it – telling Katlyn that Arthur would have to come down to retrieve his cauldron by himself - Arthur would need to begin the lesson with trying to find and retrieve his cauldron. Joy… With his luck his cauldron was probably still ( _literally_ ) running around.

After they picked up their books and bags in the dorms Arthut and Katlyn continued to follow the corridors in the dungeon to the classroom for Potions, while Jack and Jade took the stairs up to have History of Magic. ( _Of course Arthur warned them Peeves might still be nearby_ ). With the exception for Hermione, and two other Gryffindors Arthur didn't recognize, he and Katlyn were among the first ones to arrive. It wasn't until only a few minutes before the lesson would begin his fellow Slytherins and the rest of the Gryffindor arrived, including Malfoy, and Arthur did his best to ignore the quick glances Malfoy sent him with narrowed eyes. Neither did it escape Arthur's notice Hermione pointidly ignored both Harry and Ron when they showed up.

When Professor Snape finally opened the door to the classroom and let them inside Arthur and Katlyn followed Hermione to the front of the classroom and sat down in the front. Meanwhile Neville, who seemed to have grown fearful of Snape since last week, hurried to choose a seat near the back of the classroom together with Harry and Ron. Just like their previous lesson Professor Snape then began the lesson with taking their attendance before he instructed them with a sneer on his lips about the potion they were going to make. When Professor Snape was finished with the instructions everyone immediately began to prepare their cauldrons and ingredients for the potion, with the exception for Arthur who instead stood from his seat and walked over to Professor Snape's desk to ask about his cauldron.

"The instructions are on the board, Kirkland. Unless you can't read I don't see why you haven't begun with your potion."

"I only came to retrieve my cauldron, sir," Arthur explained and had to force himself to not bite back something impolite at Professor Snape's suggestion he couldn't read.

"Ah, yes, the running cauldron was yours. You can find your cauldron under the cupboard with the acid, where it has been since it ran away from my desk."

' _Why am I not surprised even cauldrons dislike being close to you,_ ' Arthur thought, but didn't say aloud.  
"Thank you, sir," Arthur instead forced himself to answer before he walked over to the cupboard Professor Snape pointed at and eyed the cupboard wearily.

Arthur still refused to end up in the Hospital Wing for the third time in two weeks, and getting drenched in acid would make sure he would, so Arthur made sure to be extra careful to not even slightly bump into the cupboard as he sat down on his knees and bent down to take a look below the cupboard. How his cauldron had managed to squeeze itself under the cupboard in the first place – all logic said the space between the floor and the cupboard _should_ have been too narrow - Arthur had no idea. However considering the fact he was currently at a school for magic Arthur probably was overthinking this, so instead of continuing to wonder about it he reached out his hand and grabbed his cauldron. It was with a big amount of relief Arthur didn't feel any movement from his cauldron, so this hopefully meant whatever the potion had done to make it able to _(literally!)_ run around had worn off by now. When Arthur finally managed to wiggle out his cauldron from below the cupboard he hurriedly went back to his table to begin with the potion, which he now was slightly behind at.

' _If I just hurry a little I should still be able to finish the potion in time though_ ,' he thought to himself with a nod, put on his protective gloves of Dragon Hide and then set to work.

Just like their last lesson Professor Snape walked around in the classroom and watched them all like a hawk. It seemed to be Professor Snape's new mission to criticize everything about Harry's potion as much as he could and scare Neville half to death, while Malfoy was one of the very few who received any praise at all. Meanwhile Arthur was just glad Professor Snape hadn't reached his table yet, because he was pretty sure something must have gone wrong with his potion. Hermione's potion looked absolutely perfectly the way it should at this point with the colour of light blue with just a tint of purple. Katlyn was also doing well, although her potion seemed to miss the purple tint and was of a slightly darker blue than Hermione's. Meanwhile Arthur's own potion didn't look nearly as perfect, or even okay.  
It was bright _**orange**_.

"Kirkland, _what_ exactly is this supposed to be?"

Well, Arthur knew he wouldn't be able to avoid Professor Snape's criticism forever. That didn't mean this was any less embarrassing though – even Harry and Ron had managed to make their potion take on a dark blue, almost black, colour - and Arthur could practically feel how his face was beginning to heat up.

"My potion, but I think something went wrong," Arthur answered with a thankfully steady voice while he _tried_ to ignore the snicker he could hear from Malfoy's direction.

"This potion is so badly made it rivals Longbottom's pitiful attempt," Professor Snape sneered back.

Well, that was a little unfair. At least his own potion wasn't shifting between the colours of black, yellow and red or look like it was boiling, unlike what Neville's potion currently did in the back of the classroom. As Professor Snape spoke an ominous-looking, brown and green smoke even began to rise from Neville's cauldron. Perhaps Professor Snape guessed what Arthur was thinking, or maybe he was just in the mood to make his students miserable, because without warning Professor Snape took out his wand and pointed it at Arthur's cauldron. After a few muttered words Arthur's cauldron was completely clean and empty.

"Re-do, and this time I suggest you try to not make a complete fool of yourself," Professor Snape then sneered to Arthur.

It was probably a good thing Professor Snape turned around and walked away from Arthur's table after that, because Arthur didn't think he would have been able to control his anger much longer. With his hands shaking in wrath Arthur angrily began to chop up a new set of ingredients for his potion and ignored the looks of pity he received from both Hermione and Katlyn. His second attempt to make the potion didn't go much better than his first one though, and the fact Arthur still tried his best to put a lid on his boiling anger certainly didn't make it easier to concentrate on the task. The only real difference was that his potion at least this time eventually turned into a dark, blood-red colour. Arthur wasn't sure if it was better than the earlier bright orange colour, but he was beyond caring at this point.

SPLAT! The mashed eye of a baby Acromantula, which had been around the size of a big tarantula before it fell victim to Arthur's anger, landed with a repelling squelch on the table next to the cauldron instead of inside it. Thank goodness he wore his protective gloves of Dragon Hide, because this was _**DISGUSTING**_. With a frustrated growl Arthur quickly cleaned away the mashed eye on the table and then mashed a new one which he dropped into the cauldron. Next up he needed to add three small pinches of ash from an Ashwinder, and unless Arthur wanted his potion to blow up in his face he would need to be careful with this part. Since he still didn't want to end up in the Hospital Wing for the third time in two weeks Arthur therefore took a deep, calming breath before he added the first pinch of ash while he stirred the potion and watched it turn from red into a dark, grey colour. He turned around to his bag of Ashwinder-ash and took the second pinch before he stepped back and added the ash into the cauldron. The potion turned into slightly lighter grey than before.

' _Wait a minute_.' Arthur was just about to turn back to the bag of Ashwinder-ash for the third pinch of ash when he stopped dead in his tracks and eyed his cauldron in suspicion. He never stepped away from the cauldron to reach his second pinch of ash, so why did he need to take a step to _get back_ to his cauldron? Without looking away from his cauldron he searched blindly with his left hand for the bag of Ashwinder-ash, but was distracted for just a moment when he heard Professor Snape call out they only had 10 minutes left to finish the potion.

That moment was enough.

Without warning Arthur's cauldron decided it was tired of standing still and jumped down on the floor, after which it ( _literally!_ ) ran off on it's small legs along the right wall towards the back of the classroom. Arthur gaped in shock for a second before anger took over. _His cauldron was running away with his potion!_

" **GET BACK HERE!** "

Arthur set off after his running cauldron, which was surprisingly fast for being- you know, a cauldron – while his classmates hurriedly stepped out of the way from the fleeing cauldron with shouts of surprise.

"Kirkland, stop fooling around this instant!" Arthur heard Professor Snape angrily shout, as if Arthur did this on purpose.

Arthur's cauldron reached the wall and made a sharp turn to the right and then turned right again, with Arthur closely behind, making them run in the empty space in the middle of the classroom which led up to Professor Snape's desk.

' _Oh god, please, no!_ ' Arthur thought and lunged after his cauldron to stop it from doing anything to Professor Snape's desk. Too late. Arthur only managed to get ahold of his cauldron after he in desperation threw himself after it while his cauldron was in the middle of it's attempt to jump up on Professor Snape's desk, and Arthur watched in absolute horror as his unfinished potion flew out of his caught cauldron like in slow-motion and drenched Professor Snape's entire desk, including all of the papers and potions on it. No one in the classroom said a word, barely dared to breathe, as they all both heard and saw how the potion _melted_ the desk and it's contents. With wide eyes Arthur swallowed in fear and slowly stood up from the floor where he previously had been laying after he threw himself after his, now completely empty, cauldron. He clutched the still weakly struggling cauldron close to his chest and saw with fear-mixed-fascination how the only thing left which soon was left of Professor Snape's desk was a black-brown liquid with spots of white on the floor where the desk previously had stood.

" _Kirkland_."

Professor Snape's voice shook dangerously in barely held back fury, and even though Arthur really didn't want to he still slowly – _oh, so very slowly_ – turned around to face the wrath of his Professor.

"Detention. Tomorrow, 6 o'clock in the morning. _Don't be late_. Now, GET. _**OUT!**_ "

With his cauldron still clutched tightly to his chest Arthur didn't waste any time and ran back to his table, hurriedly packed all of his things, fled from the classroom and didn't stop running until he was outside the castle and almost at the greenhouses for their Herbology lessons.  
Well, at least he hadn't ended up in the Hospital Wings again. Yet. He still needed to survive the detention.

. . . He really can't catch a break, can he?

o.o.o

o.o.o. ( **End of Chapter 10** ) .o.o.o

o.o.o

 **Sorry for the late chapter - my life outside of the internet-world got a bit in the way there. ^_^;  
** **I had a LOT of fun writing this chapter though! Haha, poor Arthur. He really can't seem to catch a break. xD**

 **Alright, time to answer your wonderful reviews!** \^w^/ **Really, thank you so much for all of them - they mean a lot to me,** **and they let me know you actually want to read this fanfiction!** **I'm going to write this story for my own sake, but it's always fun to know if/when people actually like the stuff I write, so THANK YOU!** **  
**

o.o.o.o.o

 **Now:**

MedusaLegend **: I hope this chapter at least partly answers it. ;)  
Well, the twins didn't show up for long, but don't worry. This isn't the last you guys are going to see from them. **

MoonyLitt-Tears **: Please don't be so harsh on your own writing. You're good, and in the future you will become even better than you already are.  
All it takes is practise - because that's the best thing about writing. You can always become better than you already are.  
So strive for it, and don't give up! **\^w^/

TardisBlue88 **: Thank you! There are many possibilites and things which can and will happen, but I should probably warn you now everything will not be revealed already in the first book. ( _I'm planning to hopefully write for the first seven books_ ).  
Thank you so much for your review, and don't worry - I like both long and short reviews! **\^w^/

Gwtan12: **Thank you so much for your review! It makes me happy to hear when people seem to like what I write.**

invicibleBritishFishandChips **: Thank you!**

Murbyss **: Thank you so much for your review!**

o.o.o.o.o

 **Now, the next chapter will be about Halloween, so let's see if I can manage to write chapter 11 before our real Halloween, shall we?  
I can't NOT promise anything, but it would be fun to upload the chapter about Halloween during the real one. **\^w^/


	11. Ch11 - A Trio of Friends

o.o.o.o.o

After the distrastrous lesson in Potions Arthur wanted nothing else but to be left alone. Unfortunately it wasn't quite so simple, and so he reluctantly had went to his lesson in Herbology with the Ravenclawas and his fellow Slytherins before he finally was free for the rest of the day. Afterwards, the moment the class was over, Arthur immediately took the oppurtunity to run down towards the lake. _He was finally alone._ Perhaps it was stupid to skip lunch, but right now Arthur couldn't stand the thought of entering the Great Hall where everyone was about to eat lunch. Arthur was already tired of the whispers which had begun to spread about what happened to Professor Snape's desk, and it wouldn't surprise him if the whole school would know about what happened before the end of the day.

Once Arthur reached the lake he sat down in the grass and leaned back against a nice, smooth rock and looked out over the lake. It was peaceful here. Unlike Arthur's stormy mind the lake was smooth with not a ripple in sight, and the chilly autumn sun made it sparkle like diamonds. In a way it felt as if nature itself tried to tell Arthur the day was too beautiful to be moping around, and so Arthur took a deep breath and tried to put his anger towards Professor Snape to the back of his mind.

It was hard to believe he had already been at Hogwarts for two weeks, and with the exception of Professor Snape's lessons he loved it here. It was nothing like being tutored at home and the long wait for one of his brothers to come home from work. Speaking of his brothers, Arthur wondered what they did right now. Patrick, William and Scott were probably busy with different kinds of meetings, but Dylan could be anywhere from free for the day to taking care of another rampaging dragon.

Maybe this was even one of those rare days when all of them were home from work early, and right now they could be eating Dylan's homecooked food while they complained about the idiots at work...

Arthur ignored the new lump in stomach and hurriedly tried to put away the thoughts about his brothers to the back of his mind. He didn't miss them. Really. Homesickness was for babies, wasn't it? In any case Arthur would get to see them again at Christmas. Besides, his brothers still wrote letters to him, so it wasn't like he had no contact with his brothers at all.

' _This is the first time you have been away from your brothers for longer than two days though,_ ' a treasonous voice in Arthur's head told him.  
 _'Is it really so surprising if you become a little homesick?'_

"I'm not homesick," Arthur muttered to himself in denial. "I don't miss them at all."

However _if_ he did, and only _if_ , then that would also be okay. Logically speaking Arthur couldn't be the only one at Hogwarts who was homesick either, which he of course wasn't! Really…

While he tried to ignore the obvious Arthur instead forced himself to do a mental check of his homework.

He had already finished his homework for Defence Against the Dark Arts, Charms and History of Magic, but he still needed to finish his work for Potions and Transfiguration. Professor McGonagall was a great, but strict, teacher, and Arthur wasn't going to risk ending up on her bad side just because he hadn't finished his homework in time. He still had the whole weekend to work on it though, since it didn't need to handed in until Tuesday.

However it didn't take long for Arthur's thoughts to return to his brothers and what they could be doing, and while the lump in his stomach grew stronger Arthur continued to stay lost in his thoughts. Eventually the sun slowly began to make its way down behind the horizon though, and Arthur began to shiver in the chilly autumn air. Perhaps it hadn't been one of Arthur's brightest ideas to sit outside in the cold autumn air in only his normal clothes and wizard robes, but it wasn't like he had planned to sit by the lake for as long as he did. Deciding it was time to head back to the castle Arthur stood up with a shiver of cold, dusted himself off and turned around - not expecting to see the gigantic man who led all first years to Hogwarts on the day they arrived.

"There yeh are, I've been looking for yeh. Were yeh planning to stay here all day til' yeh froze to death?"

Arthur suddenly became aware he must have stayed outside for much longer than he originally thought, if people even had begun to look for him.

"Well?" the man questioned loudly, and stopped in front of him when Arthur forgot to answer.

He didn't look angry though, so at least it didn't look like Arthur was in trouble.

"Sorry… Sir," Arthur hurried to answer while he shivered because of the cold air, unsure what to call the gigantic man since he wasn't a teacher.  
"I got lost in my thoughts, but I didn't mean to stay outside for as long as I did."

"Obviously, considering the lack of warmer clothes yeh are wearing. Jus' call me Hagrid, by the way. Have never been much for tha' formal crap anyway," Hagrid grunted and fished out a blanket from one of his many enourmous pockets in his black coat, which he then hung over Arthur's shoulders.

"Blimley, yeh are ice-cold! Come along, we need to warm yeh up before yeh catch yer death."

Dumfounded by the sudden turn of events Arthur followed Hagrid away from the lake. At first he thought Hagrid was just going to lead him back to the castle, but instead Hagrid led him past both the greenhouses and the Whomping Willow. After what felt like an entirnity for Arthur's freezing body, but couldn't have been more than a few minutes at most, Arthur and Hagrid arrived to a small wooden hut close to the Forbiden Forest. Upon opening the door Hagrid was then immediately loudly greeted by an enourmous black boarhound.

"Down Fang, _down_ ," Hagrid ordered the dog and eventually succeeded to make the dog, apparently named Fang, sit down so Arthur and Hagrid could enter the small house.

"Make yerself at home. Tea?"

"Yes, please," Arthur answered politely, never able to decline a cup of tea.

While Hagrid went to the fireplace and put a kettle with water over the fire Arthur took the opportunity to sit down on one of the four chair around the big table and look around. However to Arthur's big surprise the house only appeared to consist of a single room. Pheasants and hams hung from the ceiling, the table Arthur sat at stood in the middle of the room, and a massive bed with a quilt stood in the corner. For being someone of his rather large size Hagrid lived in a surprisingly small house.

The water didn't take too long to boil – magic was useful like that – and while they waited Hagrid made small talk with Arthur and asked about how he enjoyed Hogwarts and what kind of things they had learnt so far. When the water was ready Hagrid pured the boiling water into a large teapot and also gave Arthur a plate with three sandwiches.

"Yeh looked hungry, and yeh were repor'ed missing from lunch," Hagrid shrugged with a smile when Arthur gave him a questioning look.

"I figured yeh would be hungry by now. Jus' tell me if yeh want more, and I'll make some for yeh."

Arthur didn't know Hogwarts had a system to make sure the students ate or not, but he supposed it made sense.

"No, this is fine. Thank you."

It was only when he began to eat his first sandwhich Arthur realised how truly hungry he was, and it didn't take long until he had eaten all three of his sandwhiches and slowly begun to drink his tea.

"Yeh know, it is almos' scary how much yeh look like yer dead brother," Hagrid suddenly commented and sat down on the chair on the opposite side of Arthur.

"If I didn' know better I would have said you and Merlin were iden'ical twins or something. Yeh look like a younger copy of him."

"Did you know him?" Arthur asked in surprise.

"Yeah, he was a friend of mine. We fough' together agains' _you-know-who_ 's followers a few times too."

"What was he like?" Arthur couldn't help but to ask, now when he finally met someone who actually _w_ _anted_ to talk about him.

Hagrid gave Arthur a wide smile.

"Merlin acted like a grumpy ol' man most of the time, but deep down he was a real softie. Yeh should have seen his face when we threw him a birthday party! Insisted he wasn' happy at all while he couldn' fight the grin and the tears of happiness off his face."

Arthur couldn't help but to smile himself at the new information about his dead brother.

"He was so powerful too," Hagrid continued in a much softer voice. "He was so young and shouldn' have had to figh' in the war, but no one can deny his help made sure we didn' lose the war righ' then and there. Yeh can be proud of him, Arthur. Yer brother Merlin was a fine man."

"How…" Arthur began, but hesitated for a moment while he considered if he really should voice his question or not.  
"Do you know what the relationship between my older brothers was like? How did they get along?"

This time Hagrid hummed in thought for a moment before he answered.

"Hard to say, but I got the impression their relationship was a lil' rocky. The few times I saw Merlin together with yer other brothers they were almost always arguing about something. Merlin seemed to get along bes' with Dylan and the younges' twin though, but it was obvious they all cared abou' each other. It's just tha' Merlin, yer red-headed brother and the oldes' twin are people who I would call stubborn and angry worriers. With tha' I mean they have a tendency to get angry if they're worried, and then they're too stubborn to admi' being worried in the first place."

It sounded familiar to Arthur, so it didn't surprise him to hear Hagrid say that. He didn't blame Hagrid for thinking Patrick and William were twins either, and told him so. The two of them looked very similar after all, and were even close in age with only a year between them.

When the both of them had finished their tea Hagrid followed Arthur back up to the castle, where they then went separate ways and Arthur went into the Great Hall for a late dinner. Thankfully enough there weren't a lot of people still eating, but he could still feel eyes follow him when he took a seat at the Slytherin table. Arthur hurried to eat his dinner and then only went to get his books before he fled up to the library, where he just as predicted found Hermione sitting at a table. To Arthur's surprise Neville was with her as well, but Arthur didn't mind. He was thankful none of them mentioned the potion class either, and instead he and Hermione immediately began to take turns to help Neville understand his homework in Transfiguration while they also finished their own. Afterwards Hermione tried to help both Arthur and Neville with their homework in Potions. Key-word being _tried_ to.

It turned out Neville actually was more knowledgeable about the _theoretical_ parts of Potions than Arthur originally thought, because Neville had read about many of the ingredients in his books about Herbology. However even when Neville knew the answer he always asked Hermione more than once if it was the correct answer, "just to be sure". It made Arthur wonder if Neville always had this little confidence in himself and his abilities, or if it only had begun after he arrived at Hogwarts.  
To be honest Arthur wasn't sure if he wanted to know the answer to that question.

Meanwhile Potions just didn't make much sense to Arthur. He knew most, if not all, of the ingredients and what they did by heart - however the problem seemed to begin when it came to how the ingredients affected each other to become the correct potion. Arthur always perfectly followed the instructions Professor Snape wrote on the chalkboard, but for some reason Arthur's potions still never seemed to turn out as they should. It didn't make any sense!

"I don't see why you have a problem with potions. You're brilliant at all the other subjects, and as long as you correctly follow the recipe you should be able to complete a working potion. It's very similar to cooking," Hermione commented in frustrated confusion, which didn't exactly make Arthur feel better.

"Then I pray none of you ever will be unfortunate enough to taste the cooking of my family," Arthur just grumbled back in answer, ignoring both Hermione's and Neville's looks of confusion.

o.o.o.o.o

The detention with Professor Snape the next morning was horrible in itself, as if having detention six o'clock on a Saturday morning wasn't bad enough. It didn't help Arthur also had been unable to fall asleep the night before and instead had been laying awake and thought about his conversation wih Hagrid. To be honest Professor Snape was actually not too bad during the detention since he spent most of it sitting at his new _(not melted)_ desk, grading papers with a sneer on his face. For the the most part Professor Snape ignored Arthur and the other eight students from various grades and houses. It was something Arthur actually was thankful for. However at the other hand it soon became clear by the other students' whispers and glances the news about what happened the day before had spread through the school like a wildfire, and somewhere along the way had become distorted.

" _Hey, that's the Kirkland kid who melted Professor Snape's desk."_

 _"_ _Yes, I heard he sent at least two of his classmates to the Hospital Wing too. I must say it doesn't surprise me. Slytherins never care if their pranks hurt someone."_

 _"_ _Would a_ _ **Kirkland**_ _really hurt someone on purpose though? I mean-"_

"I did **_not_** send any of my classmates to the Hospital Wing, and neither did I melt Professor Snape's desk on purpose!" Arthur stated clearly through seething anger towards the two "whispering" Ravenclaw students from second year, who quickly ducked their heads in shame and immediately pretended to be working on their papers.

"No talking," Professor Snape commented without looking up from his papers.

"But-"

"No talking, Kirkland. Or would you rather spend next week after school in detention as well?" Professor Snape asked coldly as he finally looked up from his papers and met Arthur's gaze.

Still seething with anger Arthur reluctantly did as he was told and stopped to talk, but spent the rest of the detention imagining hexing Professor Snape and the two Ravenclaws with an itching spell.

Needlessly to say it was not a happy Arthur who later left the dungeons to eat breakfast, and neither did his mood become any better when the owls arrived with the post. According to the letter from Dylan all of his brothers would be away on international buissiness until the next Friday, and would therefore not be able to write him any letters during the time. To Arthur this also meant they wouldn't be able to send him a new cauldron to replace the old one, which was currently snuggling with Cassie in his bed. No, he didn't know how or why a cauldron would snuggle with a cat, and he didn't _want_ to know either, thank you very much. Arthur was busy cursing the fact he had forgotten to ask his brothers about a new cauldron in his last letter, and now he would have to wait another week before he could ask for one.

That day came quicker than Arthur thought, because now when the first "introduction weeks" were over the lessons quickly became more advanced and their homework more time consuming, even if it didn't necessarily mean it was more difficult than before. As a result Arthur also became too busy to worry about how his brothers would react to the fact he needed a new cauldron not even three weeks into his first school year. What Arthur _did_ wonder about instead was when he another week later - along with the rest of the students in the Great Hall currently eating breakfast - noticed a long, thin broom-shaped package being carried by six large screech owls towards the Gryffindor table and being dropped in front of none other than Harry Potter.

Whispers immediately broke out around the whole hall about the package, which obviously was in the shape of a broomstick. Arthur could practically hear Hermione's voice in his head tell him " _First years are not allowed their own brooms!_ ", but that rule didn't seem to stop Harry from reading the letter attached to the package and then in clear excitement show it to Ron before they quickly left the Great Hall with the package. Arthur saw how Hermione immediately left her seat and followed Harry and Ron out of the Great Hall, but this time Arthur figured it really wasn't his problem if Harry ended up in trouble if he was stupid enough to order a broom for himself despite of the rules. Instead Arthur was distracted when Scott's huge Eagle Owl, named Owlio, suddenly landed with a small thump in the middle of Arthur's breakfast with a package. Since his plate of egg and bacon now was ruined Arthur only scowled back at Owlio and gave him a piece of bacon before he took away the package.

The package not so surprisingly contained a letter and his new cauldron for Potions, and against his better judgement Arthur decided to open the letter to read it at once.

" _What the hell did you do?_ " were the very first words written in the letter, and Arthur already regretted his decision to read it.

" _I received a letter from the teacher of your house after you were given detention, because you_ _ **melted**_ _his desk in Potions class. It doesn't sound like something you would do on purpose, so how the hell did you manage that? I sent you a new cauldron with Owlio, but try to stay out of trouble from now on – otherwise I'm going to go insane from Dylan's mutterings about the Kirkland genes for trouble. Anyway, both Dylan and I are within the UK again and Patrick is back home in Ireland, so you can expect them to send you letters again as well. Stay out of trouble! /Scott."_

Well, Arthur supposed he shouldn't be surprised his brothers were contacted about the incident with the melted desk, but he couldn't help but to wonder why Scott didn't mention where William was. Probably still on international buissiness for the government, but he could still have mentioned where William was… It was good to know most of his brothers were back though, and hopefully this meant they would be able to stay at home for a while.

"Owlio, fly to the owlery and I'll come with an answer for Scott later," Arthur told the gigantic owl, and to Arthur's surprise Owlio actually listened to what he said and flew out from the Great Hall in the direction of the owlery.

With that done he gathered his things and hurried out to meet up with Hermione and Neville just outside the castle. This Saturday the sun was shining with barely a cloud in sight, and together he and Neville had finally convinced Hermione the three of them needed a break from their homework. It was almost October after all, and the weather wasn't going to become better the longer into the autumn they were here, so they might as well take the time to enjoy the nice weather while they still could.

At first Hermione only ranted about Harry's and Ron's earlier behavior with the broom _(which also was how Arthur and Neville learnt Harry apparently had special permission for it)_ , but surprisingly enough it was then Hermione who suggested the three of them should play Hide-and-Seek, and after explaining the game to Neville they had a lot of fun running around the grounds and trying to find new places to hide in. During Hermione's turn to count Arthur also got to make use of his climbling skills again, and it didn't take long before he had climbed high up in a pine. Arthur had to hide his laugher as he watched Hermione, and later also Neville, try to find him. It was funny how people usually forgot to look up when they searched for something.

After lunch they went down and sat by the lake for a while, and Neville took the opportunity to teach them a wizard card-game about dangerous plants. For the game the deck of cards were seperated into three piles of cards _(since they were three players)_. Each of their pile of cards faced the ground, and counting to three all of them then turned around the top-card of their pile so they could see the plant on their card. At this point the card activated and a miniature version of the plant would pop up from the card, and the first person to then calm down their plant and make it go back into the card again won the round and received the other players' cards. This continued until one player no longer had any cards left to turn around.

While the game sounded simple, it was much more difficult than it looked. Neville ended up outclassing both him and Hermione at the game. At one point Arthur was unlucky enough to get a miniature version of the Whomping Willow in his deck, but since not even Neville knew how to calm it down they had to push it down into the lake with a stick instead. Later in the game Arthur was then unable to stop his laughter when one of Hermione's plants from the card farted her in the face. This immediately came back to bite him when the plant turned around and farted him in the face as well, which resulted in even more laughter from the other two.

They played the game for so long they almost missed dinner, but it was a still laughing and grinning trio who went towards their respective tables in the Great Hall after they had agreed to meet up in the library the following morning. After dinner Arthur then also answered Scott's letter, where he told his brother about everything he had done during the day. Once Arthur had sent away his reply with Owlio he went back to the common room and played wizard chess with Jack. Though Arthur lost more than he won, he still had a good time playing.

Life was good.

o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o

(. **End of Chapter 11** .)

o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o

 ***/Nervous waving/* Hello everyone! Sorry for disappearing on you for so long. Life outside of the computer has been hectic,  
but I want you to know I _DO_ plan on finishing this fanfiction. It will most likely just take a very long time to do so... ^_^;  
My education will be finished late May 2018, so if nothing else I should have more time to write by then. :)  
Hopefully I will be able to get out the next chapter before then though. Believe it or not, but I don't want to make you wait longer than necessary.**

 **Originally this chapter was meant to be the Halloween chapter too, but I realized Arthur deserved to have a chance to relax before all hell break loose, so I hope you guys don't mind too much the Halloween chapter will become the next chapter instead. :)**

 **I also want to take the chance to thank you all for the wonderful reviews. Thank you!  
They mean a lot to me, both short and long ones, since they show me people actually are interested in reading this story.  
So yes... Thank you. /Jezzica**


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